Antifreeze fox
by NHunter
Summary: At a concatenation of events during his battle with Tobi, Naruto finds himself thrown into an alternative dimension, where Earth's only hope in a war against extraterrestrial aliens are girls called Pandora. Maria/Naruto/Amelia, M-rated. Disregards canon when it comes to Maria.
1. Sages don't freeze

As promised, here is the first chapter of my new crossover. Enjoy!

**Title**: Antifreeze fox  
**Author**: NHunter aka N.H. aka 夜狩猟家 aka 灰色天使  
**Genre**: General, Adventure  
**Rating**: M = NC-17  
**Pairing**: Naruto N.-U./Maria Lancelot or Amelia Evans/Naruto N.-U./Maria Lancelot  
**Warnings**: AU; Accidental Dimensional Travel; OOC; crossover; some changes to the events in "Freezing"; sage and truer-jinchuuriki Naruto, seal-master Naruto, strong and (sometimes) intelligent, sometimes wise, cool Naruto; some violence; lemons; crazy author...**  
Disclaimer**: I DO NOT own "_**Naruto**_" or "_**Freezing**_". No profit is being made. Oh, and I borrowed some names from other anime & manga. I don't own those either.

* * *

"speaking"  
'_thinking_'  
"**speaking of the higher beings** / **jutsu** / **speaking in power ****mode**"  
'_**thinking of the higher beings**_'

* * *

**Antifreeze fox  
chapter I: Sages don't freeze**

Naruto was walking through the city, trying to understand both where he was and how he had gotten here as he definitely wasn't in Elemental nations (also his summoning technique wasn't working even if he still had chakra, both his own and the Kyuubi's). Most likely his being here was caused by whatever phenomenon occurred when tried attacking Madara with senjutsu-powered **rasengan**, while the man was trying to suck him into his dimensional pocket. Oh well... He was brought out of his musing when a group of four 'bandits' appeared in front of him.

"Hey, you!" The leader of the group addressed him. "You aren't local..." No kidding! Naruto was still in his new shinobi outfit: dark-gray pants and pullover, black jounin-style vest with Uzumaki spiral on the back, armor plates strapped to his forearms, red cloak with black Amaterasu-like flames on bottom edge and Konoha hitae-ate on his forehead. "So why don't we introduce you to..."

"I have no time for you. Get lost." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki replied coldly: he really had no time for this... Unfortunately the gang didn't like his answer.

"Now, listen here, were wanted to go easy on you 'cause you're new here but now you've sealed your fate!" The leader of the bandits (who also happened to be one with most brawn) said loudly, before charging at Naruto... Only to get blond's fist implanted into his gut. Then the Kyuubi jinchuuriki raised him into the air on his fist.

"I said I have no time for you." Naruto hissed once their eyes were more or less on the same level, while also changing his blue human eyes into red and slitted Kyuubi's for a moment. Seeing that this had desired effect on the gangster, the young toad sage threw him to the feet of his band... Too bad the guy was so shaken by what he saw that he simply couldn't warn the rest of the bandits when they drew their weapons and prepared to attack.

"Bastard! You will pay for what you did to Gouzu-sama!" Naruto shrugged, before blurring out of existence, reappearing behind the gang moment later. If not for the slight billowing of his cloak and kunai appearing in his hand, one could think that he simply teleported to his new location.

"Your wounds are superficial, but I do advice to treat them." Indeed, many cuts had appeared on the bodies of the gangsters, who were now on the ground. "And I hope that this will be a good lesson to you why you shouldn't attack someone who is stronger than you... The next opponent you meet might not be as merciful." And then he returned the kunai to its holster on his right leg and walked away...

* * *

A couple of hours later Naruto was still walking through the city, but by now he left the crowded downtown and was in the more or less abandoned part next to the sea. Why the locals seemed to be afraid of living close to the sea was beyond him... Suddenly sirens went off in the distance. Using whatever sensor abilities he had without sage mode, Naruto tried to locate whatever may have caused that, but the only thing he could feel was a shift of energies on the beach not far away from his current location. Shrugging the blond jinchuuriki continued wandering through the abandoned part of the city – it's not like that thing was more dangerous than Pein, right? Especially since right now nothing too abnormal was happening there as far as he could tell...

A little bit more than an hour later his wanderings brought him back close to the anomaly. And right on time to see something happen... The dome of bluish energy some hundred feet in diameter appeared out of nowhere right over the original anomaly, while a slightly pulsing blue hexagonal pattern appeared on the ground, causing a strange sensation of being unable to move even a muscle struck him... The dome dissipated, revealing a gray and blue humanoid monster with six blade-like arms, the monster, which, apparently, was the cause of this strange 'freezing' sensation.

Not wanting to be destroyed by the alien being – and the said being seemed to be thinking about ending his life as it turned towards him – Naruto started collecting natural energies for his sage mode, and was bit surprised by how hard it was while he was 'frozen'... The monster must have felt him gathering the energies, as it swung one of it's massive arms towards him.

Thankfully the monster wasn't very fast and the blond jinchuuriki managed to enter the sage mode on time... With some effort he raised his hands to block the incoming attack, which, while not dealing any physical damage to him, still threw him good thirty meters away.

"What are you?" Naruto asked as he stood up. Of course, the alien thing didn't answer. "Oh well, doesn't matter, 'cause I'll beat you anyway!" The Kyuubi jinchuuriki proclaimed while summoning single shadow clone (this too was more difficult than normal). Together with the clone Naruto created a **rasengan shuriken**, though it took at least trice more energy than normally, so much that the clone actually dispelled from the lack of chakra once the jutsu was complete. Shrugging this off to the effects of that annoying 'freezing' field, the young sage threw the jutsu at the monster in front of him. "Die, bastard!" But to his surprise, the **rasengan shuriken** started losing energy as soon as it left his hands and completely dissipated barely three meters into its flight. "What?" Instead of an answer, he got a 'punch' from the monster to his chest, and his sage mode was the only thing that protected him from being turned into a meat paste on the ground.

Feeling that his sage mode was almost completely out of power and would fade soon, Naruto used created another shadow clone (which was supposed to distract the monster for those five seconds he needed to recharge the sage mode), and **shunshin**'ed away from the monster's sight... Four seconds later he got memory feedback from the destroyed clone. And what was worse, he knew that the monster could feel his new location... Unfortunately for it, though, it wasn't fast enough to finish the blond jinchuuriki before he reentered his sage mode...

Naruto once again used **shunshin**, this time teleporting to the roof of another building, slightly to the side from the monster, and summoned two shadow clones – one to distract the opponent, and the other to help him create another **rasengan shuriken**. The distracting clone was destroyed in a matter of seconds by the monster, but it still fulfilled its role, as it gave enough time for Naruto to complete a **rasengan shuriken**.

"OK, bastard, if I couldn't kill you from a distance..." He jumped off the building and towards the monster in front of him, aiming to hit the thing's 'abdomen' with his attack. The sage mode should be enough to protect his hand from the backlash of the jutsu. "...It doesn't mean that I can't kill you point blank!"

**~/ *** \~**

Shigeru Aoba, an assistant pilot of the Chinook-like chopper that was carrying seven Pandora-Limiter teams to deal with the latest Nova entered the passengers' cabin. Immediately everyone there looked at him.

"OK, guys... and ladies, the command center sent us a message. According to their sensors the Nova you were supposed to kill disappeared." This statement raised quite a few eyebrows: Novas were yet to show an ability to spontaneously disappear. "But you are still going there to direct an investigation." Several Pandora nodded in response, but that was all. Aoba was about to return to his pilot's seat when Makoto Hyuuga, the primary pilot of the chopper, shouted from the pilots' cabin:

"I can see the Nova. It's top half is missing. Whoever did that was strong!" Well, at least that explained why the sensors lost the Nova – it was killed. But this raised another question: who did that as all Pandora from trainees to those who already retired from the active duty were accounted for, and there were none near this location.

* * *

By the time the chopper landed some three hundred meters away from the Nova's position (as it should have been done, according to the protocols), West Genetics fourth year Pandora and their Limiters inboard had made up at least fifty different theories of what had happened there, and absolute majority of these theories was quite ridiculous.

Knowing that the Nova, S-type by the way, was already dealt with, the group wasn't in as great hurry as they would be otherwise, but it still took them less than two minutes to reach the place where the battle – those marks on the ground were a clear signs that there was one – took place. And as soon as they were there, along with the bottom part of the Nova and parts of its appendages, they could see a blond man in strange clothes leaning against the wall of a nearby abandoned building.

"Yo!" The man – while he looked to be a year or so younger than them, he had so impressive aura of an experienced warrior that no one would dare to call him just a teen – greeted them as he pushed himself off the wall. "You lot look like you can tell what the heck that thing was?" He asked, while carelessly pointing to what was left from the Nova with his thumb. A couple of Pandora materialized their Volt weapons, as they were afraid that he was an enemy, but the man didn't seem to want to fight as he put his hands in the pockets of his cloak.

"That was an S-type Nova." The girl that seemed to be the leader of the group answered, while gesturing to her comrades to put down their weapons. "But I'd like to know how you killed it, assuming that you are the one who did it." The man shrugged.

"How 'bout slamming a couple of S-rank ninjutsu into its chest? For some reason my ranged attacks failed." His words cause a lot of shocked expressions among the Pandora-Limiters group.

"Not to sound as a disbeliever, but you shouldn't have been able to move at all in the freezing field Novas produce." The same girl replied after a second – she too was surprised by the man's words.

"Yeah, had to resort to my higher-tier skills to fight it." The blond replied with another shrug. "But that nasty ability aside, this thing wasn't that tough." Three of the seven girls – the ones that were more prideful of their Pandora powers developed ticks on their foreheads from this comment. "Good name for the ability, by the way, I did see real ice forming where this Nova thing was standing." There was an argument among the group, to which the man didn't bother to listen to, before their leader spoke again.

"You are coming with us to the West Genetics." That was an order, despite the fact that it was clear that she wasn't sure that her group would be able to force him, should he be unwilling to comply. Without causalities, that is.

"As long as I get some answers to the questions I have, and you don't use me as lab rat, I see no reason to deny your request." He replied with yet another shrug, before making a threat: "But should you try something funny with me... Let's just say that my demons are quite real." The leader-girl nodded.

"Well, if you'd follow us... um..."

"Namikaze-Uzumaki Naruto." The man helped. He looked like he was about to say something more, but decided against it.

"Thanks. If you'd follow us, Naruto-san." With a nod, the man followed the group back to the chopper.

**~/ *** \~**

"Welcome to West Genetics." A young woman, in her early twenties, with greenish hair made into a ponytail greeted Naruto once stepped onto the landing pad... The woman was wearing purple shirt and dark-gray miniskirt under a white lab coat. "I'm Elize Schmitz and you'll be in my care for the time being."

"Nice to meet you. I'm Namikaze-Uzumaki Naruto, though the use of either last name alone is OK too." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki replied with a slight bow, before lowering his voice so that only his converser would hear him. "But I'd feel much more welcome if they'd stop pointing sharp things at my neck." He nodded towards the Pandora behind him.

"Now Namikaze-san, If you'd follow me..." She said, before turning around and starting walking away. A couple of step later she stopped and turned around. "I'll be in my office if anyone needs me." Her words, though, made it clear that she didn't want any of the Pandora following her and her guest, who, by now, caught up with her.

Naruto and Elize walked through what seemed to be a mix between a military base and a very rich civilian school. The trip wasn't long, though, as they soon arrived to Elize's office, which was an infirmary, meaning that this woman was head nurse or something there. Out of the windows in the office the blond jinchuuriki could see a room with medical equipment he had never seen before (though with doctors in Konoha healing everything with chakra that wasn't very surprising).

"Now, Namikaze-san..." The green-haired nurse said once they were comfortably sitting in her office. "I feel that there are many things you'd like, but I want you answer some of my questions first." The blond nodded. "And my first question would be what are you and where are you from, because I know for sure that no normal human can move in a freezing field, yet you did that and even killed an S-type Nova."

"I'd say that I'm a genin of Konohagakure no Sato, but I'm sure than you know not of such place, so I'll limit myself to saying that I'm from what appears to be an alternative dimension..." He made a pause to let the woman in front of him absorb this information. "As for why I'm here? I believe my traveling here to be an accident, caused by a concatenation of circumstances during my last battle in my home world."

"That should explain your choice of clothes..." Elize replied, still not exactly believing what she had just heard.

"Is there something wrong with those? Aside from the lack of orange, of course." This caused the nurse to let out a giggle. "Also, I think it'd be easier if we are on the first name basis, Elize-sensei." She nodded.

"Very well, Naruto-san. If what you said is true, then comparing your abilities to those of either Pandora or Limiters would be useless and you should be classified as a separate class of entities." Even though he didn't like the dry scientific language Elize was using, he nodded in agreement. "I'd also like to run a couple of tests on you to see the extent of what your body can do. We are currently in a period of peace in a war with extraterrestrial life-forms called Nova and anything that can give us additional powers to stop them from wiping humanity from the face of Earth would be very useful."

"I doubt that I'll be of much help there as most my skills were useless in that freezing field, and those that worked, required a certain power up that I'm not willing to teach to anyone there due to the risks involved. That is if they can learn it all..." Naruto replied. "But back to the original question, as long as you don't try anything I don't like, I'm fine with being your test subject. So let's say that I have the right to refuse cooperation for certain test, and we have a deal." Elize nodded.

"That is actually more than I expected." She said. "I believe I don't have any more questions right now, so I'll answer yours now."

"Can you explain what is going on here. With some explanations to the terms you use." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki requested.

"Very well. This might be a long story, so can I offer you some drinks before we begin?" Naruto nodded. "Will some coffee be OK?" At his nod Elize got up and walked to the corner of her room where something like coffee machine was. She asked what kind of coffee he'd like, and, getting the answer that he had no preferences, decided to make two espresso for them. "Also, before we begin, I'd like you to know that today is 17th march 2065, but you might have already noticed that." The blond shinobi nodded – he had seen a couple of different newspapers with this date today in the city. "OK... First of all, I'd like to explain what Novas are."

"That would be helpful." Naruto agreed.

"As you might have noticed, Novas are an extraterrestrial silicon-based life form, that have an ability to freeze everything within a certain radius. The only exceptions to this rule would would be Pandora in either Nova or Pandora forms, and you. Limiters, while using **Erienbar set** can locally neutralize freezing field of Nova and create their own... As we are right now, humanity's knowledge about Novas is limited and most of it is beyond my level of clearance, even though I'm a retired Pandora myself. As far as I know, even the reason behind the attack is unknown... Novas can't stay in Earth atmosphere for long, and will self-destruct after about thirty six hours. That is how we 'won' the first clash in 2012..."

"Am I to assume that a weapon to fight Novas was found?" Naruto asked as he accepted his coffee from Elize.

"Yes. Pandora are this weapon. The first one had Nova flesh implanted in her body, but later a special genetically-altered tissue called stigmata came into use. Currently Pandora have up to six stigmata in their bodies, but even in the recent history there were special individuals that had more. My comrade and dear friend, Kazuha Aoi, had twenty and was considered to be one of the strongest Pandora in history... Anyway, all Pandora have strength and speed beyond what normal human can achieve. Their bodies are also more durable."

"Sound a bit like a certain type of 'upgrades' used back in my world..." Naruto commented. "Though we definitely didn't fuse demonic flesh with human..." Seeing Elize's confusion, he added: "Yes, our world has some real demons. Most of those aren't that strong, but some... Anyway, can you please continue your lecture."

"As I have mentioned, Pandora have two extra modes. One of them is called Nova mode and occurs when one of us allows stigmata to corrode our bodies too much. Generally, if this happens, Pandora's life is forfeit. There are rumors that a couple of Pandora during the fourth clash could exit this mode safely, but there are no confirmation to that." Elize paused for a second, before continuing. "Pandora mode is something most Pandora have. It boosts our abilities and allows us to move in the freezing field without a support from Limiter. But it has time limit of three minutes and leaves us barely able to move at all after the time runs out."

"And Limiters are somehow assigned to Pandora? I saw that every Pandora had a Limiter with her, and each pair seemed to be rather close."

"Assigned would be a wrong word here. Pandora chooses a Limiter, or several, while in training – but you can have only one when she's graduated – and performs a ritual called Baptism to form Erienbar set – a connection between all five senses of Pandora and her partner. Also, Pandora gives her Limiter one of her stigmata. Since this requires a lot of trust between them, most if not all Pandora-Limiter pairs are lovers. And at least eighty percent of them marry each other once they are old enough." The green-haired nurse said, giggling slightly when she noticed Naruto blushing at her mentioning 'lovers' part. "Only Limiters that had gone through baptism can use their abilities. I know only one exception to this rule, but he's just as special as his sister was..."

"You mentioned clashes several times during your explanations. What were those events?" The blond sage asked.

"Occurrences when Novas attack are called clashes. So far there were nine, all, except for the last two, separated by eight years. There were only three years between eighth and ninth clashes, though... During each clash there were several Novas popping around the world near major cities. Except for the last battle of the second and the eights clashes, Novas always appeared alone... And since there was a Nova attack today, I suppose, the tenth clash began." Naruto nodded.

"Thank you, Elize-sensei, that was very informative." He made a small pause to finish whatever coffee was still there in his cup. "Now I have one other question. Will I have a place to stay here? I got no money and while I have no problems with sleeping outside, having a comfy bed and a roof over my head would be preferable."

"Actually the headmistress agreed to let you use one of the rooms in male part of the dormitory. Well, as long as you keep it clean..." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki groaned: he hated cleaning. "...And don't break anything." The green-haired nurse said. "Also, the mess has some food that you can get for free. It's only one portion per person, and, honestly, that food isn't as tasty as the one you have to pay for, but I think you wouldn't mind that much." Naruto nodded. "I'll talk to headmistress, and, hopefully, you will be payed for my tests, as well as you will get a stipend once you join the ranks: you've already proved that you can defeat a Nova even if your abilities are different from our."

"That would be really great. Pass my thanks to her for the room too." The blond sage said. Elize nodded.

"I'll show you where your room is." She said, before taking a plastic card from the pocket of her lab coat. "This is the key. I strongly advise against losing it." She added, before giving the key to Naruto. "As you will notice, the dorms are shared, but I still would advise against visiting girl's rooms without an invitation." By this time they had exited the building where Elize's office was and were now approaching western-styled four story house built from red bricks. "You room will be on the second floor. I _do_ hope you will be able to find it there yourself." Naruto, unfortunately, took offense to that.

"Hey! I'm not stupid!"

"Sorry." Elize apologized. "Anyway, meet me tomorrow in the mess – a single-story house next to the dorms – at eight in the morning, and I'll tell what we will have planned for your that day." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki nodded.

"Thank you. Have a nice evening." He said, before entering the dormitories. Quickly getting to the second floor, Naruto went along the corridor, looking for the room that was assigned to him. Instead of the normal lock in it, the door had a small plastic box next to it, with a slot for a key-card... Indeed, when he slid the card he was given through the device, there was a 'click' and the door became unlocked. Shrugging, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki entered the room, and was momentary surprised by how big and well-furnished it was. But in the end decided that he could ponder about that – and the lack of local students in the corridors too – in the morning: he was quite tired from the today's events...

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That's all folks  
leave me a **Review**!


	2. West Genetics

Here's the newest chapter for the "_**Antifreeze fox**_" story. Enjoy!

*** Review response**:  
**alchemists19**,** fanficreader71**, **chm01**, **puma1sunfire**, **Richy1991**, **ddcj1990**, **Aeon master of time and space**, **ebm6969**, **turki-sama**, **Tenshi no Genei**, **Elemental Dragon Swordman**, **Beginning and the End**, **sh8ad8ow**, thank you for your reviews, folks!  
**Psudocode Samurai**, hm, dunno, aside from the hotel arc (and now the Mark IV arc), I didn't find the manga any darker that many others.  
**Gin of the wicked smile**, Satellizer would have been too obvious, plus she gets enough lovin' as it is. Maria, though,... Amelia too.  
**hanipman**, Naruto isn't stupid in this story: he knows that as he got to this world by accident, the chances of him finding the way home are slim to none. Plus his knowledge of time-space techniques is almost zero (aside from summoning, which doesn't work for toad contract here), so he knows he can't create a seal or something to send him back at his current level.  
**Alphawolfy28**, you almost got what I want him to become... I will remember the term 'Editor' - you might actually see in the future chapters.  
**zrodeathwing**, no, Naruto is Maria-busy during that arc. So he won't have a chance to kill that bastard.  
**Still Not Dead Yet**, you won't hear that combination often - only during the official introductions (I think there will be 3-5 more only throughout the entire story), so, please, deal with it.  
**Phanotak**, no jutsu for Pandora (maybe some basic taijutsu, but that is the **limit**). Ninjutsu Naruto uses... well, only sage-powered (and Kyuubi-powered) will work in the freezing field: you can't freeze entire planet (or a beast of pure energy in a dimensional pocket). But even they need much more energy to get the same result as outside the field.  
**Liger01**, **OutlawJustice**, he's still watched by cameras and other monitoring devices (and while he can defeat several Pandora with bad teamwork, a combat-hardened cell of seven Pandora-Limiter pair will defeat him without much trouble (unless he goes all-Kyuubi on them (and lose himself to the beast in the process)). In other words, he has his freedom for as long as he doesn't do something they don't like. And should he step out of the limits, he will be dealt with.

*** Jutsu list**: **Shinobi techniques**:  
**Shunshin** - (D-rank) body flicker technique - short-range teleportation.  
**Kage bunshin** - (A-rank) shadow clone technique - creates solid copies of a user.  
**Kyuumon: kai** - (? rank) gates of life: release - opens second inner gates.  
unnamed earth-element ninjutsu - allows user to freely manipulate the earth in about 70 feet radius. very chakra-intensive technique.  
sage-mode extended reach aura - just what the name implies: it extends one's reach in hand-to-hand combat.  
*** Jutsu list**: **Pandora-Limiter techniques**:  
**Erienbar set** - initiates the sharing of senses between the Pandora and her Limiter(s). Required for the Limiter(s) to use **Freezing** technique.  
**Freezing** - Limiter locally negates the Freezing field of Nova and (stronger ones) deploy their own freezing field.  
**Accel turn** - increases speed of a Pandora. 5x acceleration allows one to move with a speed close to sound barrier. Not all Pandora can use this technique.  
**Tempest turn** - 'cloning' through sheer speed. So far the shown limit is 10 copies. Not all Pandora can use this technique.

*** Poll**: Who doesn't know yet, there is a poll about the pairing for this story posted in my profile. The options are: Naruto/Maria or Naruto/Maria/Amelia.

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**Disclaimer**: I DO NOT own "_**Naruto**_" or "_**Freezing**_". No profit is being made. Oh, and I borrowed some names from other anime & manga. I don't own those either.

"speaking"  
'_thinking_'  
"**speaking of the higher beings** / **jutsu** / **speaking in power ****mode**"  
'_**thinking of the higher beings**_'

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**chapter II: West Genetics**

The bed was a bit too comfortable as only an alarm clock saved Naruto from sleeping in the next morning... Quickly going through his morning routines and getting dressed in his usual (and currently the only one) attire, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki left his room and headed to the building Elize identified as mess yesterday evening. This time he saw some students in the corridors, but he was in a hurry and they could tell that and didn't stop him to question him...

The mess was spacious, possibly even twice as big as the dining hall in princess Koyuki's castle back in his world, and it had several where you could get food, though at this hour only three were working. Finding the one that would allow him to eat for free, he got his portion: some porridge, two slices of white bread with some butter, and a glass of tea. ...Well, this portion was actually better than he had expected it too be – hooray for being a part of a well-financed military organization!

Finding a table to eat at too wasn't a problem, as there were only so many people – mostly upper years and some staff – in the great hall. And since it was still ten to eight in the morning, he had some time to eat before his meeting with Elize-sensei.

Several minutes later, just before eight o'clock in the morning, the green-haired nurse entered the mess and, quickly finding her 'target' there, approached him... And giving in to her mischievous nature, she decided to try to sneak up on him. That proved to be a bad idea as as soon as she made a move to try to touch him from behind, the blond jinchuuriki disappeared from his seat, reappearing behind her, kunai to her neck and her left arm twisted painfully behind her back... Only year of being Pandora allowed Elize to materialize one of her daggers in time to 'protect' herself from his knife.

Once Naruto realized whom it was in his hold, he let her go and, returning the kunai to its original place, returned to his breakfast, all the while paying no attention to the people in the hall who were looking at him in awe as he had just 'outmaneuvered' a war veteran Pandora.

"A piece of a friendly advice, Elize-sensei, never sneak up on someone who was on a battlefield less that twenty four hours ago." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki said once the green-haired nurse sat next to him. She nodded.

"I should have known better than to do it." She replied. "Anyway, I had another talk with the headmistress yesterday night. We agreed that you will be paid 450 yen per test I run on you and another 3100 yen weekly as you will be kept in reserve and ready for mobilization, along with the fourth years." Naruto nodded: from the prices he had seen today, those money would be enough to let him eat pretty much anything he'd want, and there still will be enough to get some new clothes – no matter how good he looked in his 'sage' outfit, he needed to have something else to wear...

"So, what am I doing today, sensei?" The blond sage asked.

"I'm giving you a full physical today, Naruto-_kun_. It should take most of the day, as I'm going to be really thorough with you..." '_Not every day you get to study so__m__eone fro__m__ another di__m__ension who can beat a Nova on his own._' She added in her mind. "And when you don't have tests with me, you'll have theory lessons with first years..." Naruto groaned: he hated this kind of things, even if he understood that he needed those in order to 'survive' in this world – apparently he had no easy way to return home. "...And PE and practicals for combat with third years. We're not sure about letting you join the carnival when there's one, though." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki nodded: this was fine with him.

* * *

The first set of the tests of his physical took about two hours, most of which the Kyuubi jinchuuriki spent in just his pants, while various medical machines were measuring various parameters the green-haired nurse needed... Once the set was complete, Elize announced the results:

"From what I've seen so far, your body is in perfect condition, though I've never seen such dense muscles anywhere before – this must be the result of your training, right?" Naruto nodded. "Also, your nerve system seems to work much faster that the one of the normal human, but that too was expected." She paused, raising her eyes from the papers to look at him. "And aside from those scars on your chest and back, it looks like you've never been wounded in your life. Where did you get it?" The blond sage ruffled the hair on the back of his head.

"You must understand that thanks to my regenerative ability, only most serious wounds will leave a lasting mark... These two scars were made by an assassination ninjutsu of the lightning element. It cauterized the wound and my body couldn't heal it completely." Elize stared at him.

"Are you saying that someone made a hole through your chest, and you lived?" He just nodded, making her shake her head. "Anyway, back to our original topic. I also went ahead and measured your potential as a Limiter. Dunno whether this will make you sad or not, but it is almost zero." Naruto shrugged.

"Not like I could become a Limiter anyway: my body rejects anything ...abnormal added to it, like stigmata, and from what you said yesterday, Limiter needs to have some in order to access his abilities." The green-haired nurse nodded, accepting this piece of information for now: despite the advances of genetics in the twenty-first century, it still took some time to decode person's DNA...

"Now, let's continue onto the next set of your tests. Please, lie down here." Elize said, while gesturing towards the couch in her office. "Oh, and remove the rest of your clothes." She added then hastily, causing Naruto to blush quite a deep shade of red.

"Wha-?" He 'asked', hoping that the green-haired nurse would change her mind about that last part. Unfortunately for him, she was unyielding.

"I said, you're having a full physical today, so stop complaining, Naruto-_kun_." Groaning, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki did as he was asked, trying his best not to turn into a human tomato at her offhand comment that, should he have at least some stamina, whichever girl he will end with would be always happy and very sated...

* * *

For the next several hours Elize studied every single inch of his body, writing all her findings down in her seemingly endless notebook for later in depth analysis. But even without that she could easily tell that he had a 'perfect' body that was also far beyond the limits of a normal human. Not that _anyone_ would mind that, especially with the Nova situation...

In the end, though, the green-haired nurse was done for the day and let Naruto leave her office. Since it was already well past four in the afternoon, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki decided that he'd have an early dinner and retire to his room: these tests surprisingly took a lot out of him, and tomorrow he will have more, this time under stress... He just didn't feel like doing anything tonight. Not even getting to know his neighbors...

**~/ *** \~**

Finally, after three days of tests, Naruto had a 'day off' and was to attend classes with the first years of the academy. He was actually a bit excited about that as so far he had met only Elize-sensei and his three dormitory neighbors – two third years and one second year, but he still barely saw them as they spent most of their time either attending classes or in their respective Pandora's rooms.

Speaking of the tests. If he had thought that the first day was tiring... On the second day Elize had him running a damn marathon while various devices connected to his body were measuring his body's parameters... And the third day of tests wasn't much better as he was first had tomography, then was pushed to his limits on abilities of the tiers one and two – meaning he had a friendly spar with the retired Pandora – and had another tomography. And then another spar, this time with portable versions of the devices he faced yesterday... At least, he had pushed her quite hard during the spar, even if he wasn't using his sage mode or the Kyuubi. Yet. As Elize wanted to see what the power of his sage mode was during their next test. Of course, she'd never know what that really was – to her it'd be just 'tier three' abilities...

Since today he was to attend classes with the first years, instead of spending the whole day as a lab rat, Naruto allowed himself to spend some more time on getting ready for the day than usual, so when he finally arrived to the mess, it was already more or less filled with the students... Surely, his unusual clothes drew attention to him, but since the rumors about the Nova-slayer were circulating 'round the academy for a couple of days already, most students were just whispering to each other about him, not daring to approach him. And this suited Naruto just fine at the moment.

Quickly eating his breakfast, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki headed to the building where, according to Elize-sensei, lectures for students were held, but almost as soon as he left the mess, he was confronted by a girl with short blue hair, who was accompanied by three boys.

"Hello there, I'm Miyabi Kannazuki and I'd like to get to know you a bit better." While this sounded pretty innocent, the girl was just rubbing him the wrong way for some reason (most likely because of her male harem that followed her). Still, she was yet to do anything that would really offend him, so he had to be as respectful to her as he would to anyone else...

"Naruto Namikaze-Uzumaki." The blond shinobi introduced himself. "But right now I'm a bit in a hurry, so, please, let's ...talk to each other later." The girl, Miyabi, apparently, didn't like his answer. She did a step towards him, trying to look intimidating, but, unfortunately for her, it didn't work on Naruto: he had fought against Ichibi no Shukaku when he was twelve, after all... "Really. I'm in a bit of hurry right now..."

"**Erienbar set!**" She commanded, as her and her Limiters' eyes flashed for a brief moment. "You are coming with me." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki, though, was already gathering natural energy for his sage mode. Of course, not knowing better Miyabi mistook him standing absolutely still for him being agreeable to do as she wanted... What a mistake. She reached out to touch him, only to find her hand in an iron grip.

"**Freezing!**" Three limiters said as one, creating that annoying field in hopes of 'saving' their mistress. Naruto raised an eyebrow.

"This doesn't work on me." The blond sage said. "Now leave me alone." With those words he gave the blue-haired Pandora a 'love tap' that sent her crashing into the nearest Limiter of hers like she weighted nothing. This shocked the four so much that they didn't even follow Naruto as he continued walking towards the lecture halls... Thankfully, he had arrived there without any more _incidents_.

**~/ *** \~**

"Having fun with your new toy?" Yumi Kim, physics teacher and training instructor of West Genetics, asked as he dropped into the chair next to her 'old' comrade Elize Schmitz. The green-haired Pandora next to her looked up from monitor.

"Well, it's not everyday you get a chance to study someone who is from another world, and possessed abilities similar yet completely different from our own." Yumi took a quick look at her friend's monitor, which showed several complex diagrams, for the most part beyond her understanding.

"Similar?" She asked. "You said yourself that his potential as Limiter is zero. And he is definitely not a male version of Pandora." Elize shrugged, before switching to another program that showed an image depicting Naruto's bio-electrical aura next to similar a scan taken from Kazuha when she joined Pandora program. "These are his and Kazuha-chan's scans respectively."

"So bright..." Yumi said in a surprise: indeed, Naruto's aura was at least trice as powerful as the other one. And it had a pattern that was pretty similar to the aura of a Pandora...

"As you can see, he has similar 'aura', for the lack of better term, as Pandora... or a Limiter, but there are some differences that make him incompatible with our techniques. He, though, more than makes up for that with his own moves, both taijutsu and what he calls ninjutsu." Elize paused for a moment. "I sparred against him yesterday to get some more data about how his brain works in combat situation... He used only first two tiers of his abilities – the 'second' one actually is similar to what our miss I'm-here-to-find-my-soulmate calls Sacred gates – but he actually managed to make me use **double Accel**."

"You mean... He can brute-force his way through freezing field and possesses skills enough to make you fight seriously?" Yumi said in surprise. "Damn, he's good." A pause. "Wait, you said, first two tiers? How many does he have?"

"He told me about four. But, according to him, only third and fourth will allow him to move in the field." The green-haired nurse replied. "Like he said, tier one is his 'normal' abilities, but from what I can tell, those would be enough to beat most first year and some second or even third year Pandora. Tier two is him opening first two inner gates – I assume those are the same thing as Rana's Sacred gates – and gives him huge boost in strength and roughly doubles his speed, plus allows him to temporarily forget about tiredness." Elize continued. "Tier three, the 'sage mode', according to him – I haven't seen it yet – gives him ability to brute-force his way through freezing field, gives him another great boost in strength and speed and hardens his body to the point where he can take a hit from a Nova without even a bruise."

"And 'tier four'?" Yumi asked, almost afraid of what she may hear.

"He said that it is his inner demon, whatever that means. But he promised that he will never use it, unless it is absolutely necessary." The West Genetics training instructor sighed.

"Well, at least we are safe from that..." She made a pause. "As you know, tomorrow he will have a sparring practice with the third years. Where would you rank him?"

"He promised me that he will try to limit his attacks not to do too much damage to others during spars." Elize replied. "But if I were to rank him... Third or even second: only Chiffon and Elizabeth have a chance against him. The later only if she manages to keep her distance from him – he will crash her defenses with little problem." Yumi nodded. "It might be possible that he can defeat Chiffon too... His abilities are different, so he has an element of surprise on his side."

"Well, at least now I don't have to worry about him sending too many to you tomorrow." Elize smiled with her eyes.

"If I didn't have a boyfriend, I wouldn't mind having him there outside our tests. Believe me, whatever he did to get to his level, made him a damn Adonis. I have little doubts that he will break many hearts here, if and when he will finally chooses a girl to settle down with."

"Oh..." That was all that Yumi could reply.

**~/ *** \~**

A woman in her forties, most likely another retired Pandora, entered the semi-circular classroom where she was supposed to read a lecture on fifth clash to the first years and one other certain...warrior, who appeared at the West Genetics several days ago seemingly out of blue.

"Good morning, class." She greeted her students. They, of course, greeted her back, like they should have done by the protocol. "Before we begin, I'd like to introduce ...a new student that will be joining your class on occasions." She looked around the classroom, trying to locate the blond man, but he seemed to be absent... Even if the watch said that he enter the building, asking for this specific auditorium. "Namikaze-Uzumaki Naruto." She said, hoping that the boy was there and she wasn't making a fool of herself... She wasn't, as once she finished his name, the blond appeared in the far corner of the classroom in a poof of white smoke, causing everyone to look at him.

"Good morning, and nice to meet you lot." Naruto said as stood up from his seat and bowed. "Since I do not feel like being bombarded with questions now or later on, let me take a couple of minutes of this lecture to say the following: yes, I'm the one rumored to kill that Nova several days ago. Yes, I did that myself, but, no, I'm neither Pandora nor Limiter: my powers have different origins. I'll be with your year for theory lessons and with third years for combat practice. If you have any further questions, those can wait till lunch break. Thank you." Finishing his speech, the boy sat down, but not before gesturing to the professor to continue her lecture...

The retired Pandora sighed: the boy made a bit of a spectacle out of his introduction. But then again, he seemed to be more mature than the rest of the students in the room, that was in his eyes: he had seen war. Deciding that they had indeed wasted enough time already, she started her lecture.

* * *

Some things never change, Naruto decided. He still hated boring lectures and anything that dealt with theoretical aspects of knowledge, but knowing what he was fighting against, and whom he was fighting alongside was important, so he endured... And now he was free: the lectures were over, and it was only half past three in the afternoon. Not really knowing what to do for the rest of the day, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki decided to head back to the dorms and, maybe, meet some more of his 'neighbors'. Unfortunately, there was one big obstacle on his way back to his room: a group of third year Pandora, including the one he met this morning, accompanied by their Limiters, were standing in his way.

"Is there any reason you lot decided to meet me this fine afternoon?" The blond sage asked, while using his experience from dealing with various missing-nin and other opponents he had fought to determine the strength of the group. Alone, neither of the 'sets' was a problem for him, even without Kyuubi's power, but if they were to work together... the fight will be very difficult and will result in a lot of damage, but, most likely he still would win.

"I know that you are new here..." Blond girl of an aristocratic appearance,who was both the strongest among the Pandora, and the leader of this group, said. "But you must have already being informed that as this academy is a military institution, the older years are superiors to younger ones, and should be respected as such. You should be taught a lesson for what you did this morning to your senpai." Naruto crossed his arms on his chest.

"First, I have no desire to be part of male harem, nor do I take being attacked lightly: you can't survive the war if you do..." He made pause. "But to answer you... I do not belong to any particular year at this institution. Though, I'm a part of the fast-response squads, along with the fourth year Pandora and their Limiters. Doesn't that mean, I'm of the same rank as them?" Several of the girls _opposing_ him were now decidedly uneasy, most likely because they feared what their senpai will do, should they hear about this. "But if you still want to fight me, well, we have a sparring practice tomorrow." The blond sage started leaking some of his killer intent, enough to bring Limiters to their knees, actually. But this was something he needed to do to make his point clear. "Whatever problem you have with me can wait till then. I don't want to fight now. Have a good day." And making a single-handed handseal, he disappeared from the street via **shunshin**. Elizabeth Mably, the blond girl that spoke to him, sighed.

"He is right, though. Yumi-sensei informed us two days ago that we will have extra participant in our practices. What is the point of fighting him now and having a chance of being punished for summoning our weapons outside practices, when we can beat him as much as we want tomorrow. And do that absolutely legally." There were several nods. "I'm off to the pool. Andre, follow me." Her Limiter, who was still experiencing the aftereffects of being exposed to jinchuuriki-level KI, nodded and quickly followed his mistress, almost as if he was afraid something will happen to him, should he lose the sight of her...

**~/ *** \~**

The next morning the third year Pandora and Yumi-sensei were gathered at the stadium where the sparring practices was held, and even though there still was a couple of minutes before the start of the practice, both the girls and the sensei were looking for Naruto, whom they couldn't see yet...

"Um...It seems that..." Yumi started speaking, but she was cut short as the Kyuubi jinchuuriki chose this moment to leave his spot on the branch one of the trees that grew around the stadium, appearing in front of them in his sage attire, complete with his cloak.

"Kami-sama, your suck at sensing those nearby." He said, dusting imaginary dirt from his cloak. "But then again, you don't have to deal with the enemies that strike from the shadows on the daily basis..." Now he was standing slightly to the right from the Pandora, contrasting sharply with them for they all were dressed in white T-shirts and red shorts. "Shall we begin?" Yumi nodded.

"Very well. Why don't you go first, Naruto-san?" She asked. The blond shrugged and walked into the arena, a circle of about thirty feet in radius, where all fights were held.

"I remember Miyabi-san having a bone to pick with me, why don't we give her a chance to fight me?" The Kyuubi jinchuuriki said then. The Korean instructor thought for a couple of seconds, but then nodded: after all, Elize had assured her that Naruto would not hurt the girls too much... The blue-haired Pandora grinned and joined the blond shinobi on the arena.

"You seem so sure that you can win against me. How 'bout we make a deal?" She said. "If I win you will join my ...friends." Calling the trio of her Limiters 'servants' in front of a Number was _not_ a good idea... He shrugged.

"And should I win, you will cease trying to get me to become your ...friend." Naruto replied, deciding to be a bit out of character and play on his opponent's arrogance: he could see it clearly that Miyabi was not taking him seriously. Even after the display of power he did yesterday. Well, it's not like her being a thick head was his problem. ...The blue-haired Pandora, indeed was thinking that she could win against him, so she agreed.

"Deal." Yumi-sensei, seeing that the two were now ready to fight, walked to edge of the arena circle and raised her hand.

"You both know the rules, right?" She asked, receiving two nods in response – Elize had instructed Naruto about the sparring rules when they had their own match during the tests. "Then, hajime!" She said, gesturing them to begin. Miyabi wasted no time and materialized her flying daggers. Naruto merely raised an eyebrow: his opponent was a ranged fighter... Winning against her would not be hard as she undoubtedly (now) was not that good with hand-to-hand combat. Though, those daggers might be a problem... Naruto drew a couple of kunai that he normally carried in his sleeves.

"Prepare yourself!" Miyabi said, while sending her daggers at him... The Kyuubi jinchuuriki ducked under the one flying towards his head, and knocked the other ones away with his knives, before dashing towards the Pandora, displaying the speed that was far greater that anyone should have while not using **Accel turn**.

As soon as he was close enough, the blond shinobi threw a punch at his opponent, forcing her to dodge, which she did, even if barely, as she was quite surprised by his abilities... Jumping to the side to avoid the daggers, Naruto returned the kunai to their sheathes and went for another attack. He knew that this time Miyabi will be prepared, but not for this as his attack will be a bit different this time... When he got pretty close to her, he sent a concentrated killing intent towards her, forcing the blue-haired Pandora to freeze for a moment. Hoping to end the fight now, he did a palm trust towards her chest... It connected with nothing, even if he could see her still standing in front of him.

"Afterimage." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki said to no one in particular, before ducking under a chopping attack towards his neck that Miyabi tried to execute. He whirled around and sent another palm strike, this time to her torso. This time the blue-haired Pandora wasn't fast enough to dodge completely, and while her opponent's attack did no damage to her, it broke her concatenation for a moment, allowing him to grab two of daggers out of the air and deflect the rest with them, before throwing those two at her.

"Damn!" The girl cursed, as she was forced to dodge her own weapons – well, redirect them away from herself... and with the amount of power Naruto put into his throws, it was not that easy. And while she was saving herself from her own daggers, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki managed to get close and attacked her with an uppercut which sent her flying... While this attack was painful, Miyabi thought that not all was lost... that was until Naruto appeared just above her and sent her towards the ground with a powerful kick. The blue-haired Pandora fell on her back, hitting the ground hard, and it looked like she won't be fighting anymore today.

"Winner, Namikaze-san." Yumi announced, while a couple of Pandora removed Miyabi from the ring. Thankfully she didn't have any serious injuries and won't have to spend more than a couple of hours in the infirmary. Naruto himself walked up to the tree he hid in before, and leaned against it... Once the 'arena' was clear, Yumi-sensei announced the next pair to have their spar: a couple average Pandora, both of whom were just beneath Miyabi in terms of their skills...

* * *

There were several more fights, involving Pandora of lower ranks (in terms of power and skills) of the group. Naruto still watched those spars, as one day he might find himself on the front-lines of the 'war' against Nova next to these girls...

"The next spar will be between Arnett McMillan and..." Yumi-sensei started speaking, but the red-haired Pandora in training interrupted her:

"I'd like to fight against Uzumaki-san." She stated, while looking at the blond, who was still leaning against that tree. The others, almost simultaneously, turned to look at him as well... Naruto shrugged.

"Well, if lady so desires." He replied, pushing himself off the tree and walking into the circle, taking place opposite from Arnett. "Yumi-sensei?" He said then. The trainer Pandora shook her head, as if she was startled a little.

"Okay... If you are sure, Namikaze-san..." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki nodded. "Very well... Hajime!" The red-haired third year Pandora materialized her weapon, a scythe, while Naruto did not move at all, studying his opponent with his senses.

"You might want to be serious with me, blondie. I'm ranked fourth in my year, after all!" Arnett boasted. The blond sage shrugged, causing her to get angry at how he dismissed her.

"Sure you are..." He said. Instead of replying verbally, the redhead disappeared in a blur of speed, reappearing behind him a moment later. Much to her surprise, though, Naruto felt her attack coming and successfully dodged it. She tried attacking him again, and this time he didn't dodge. Instead he caught her scythe mid-swing by its handle and, before she could react, ripped it out of her hands. Then he kicked her, sending her flying away... The red-haired Pandora recovered while still in the air, and gracefully landed on her feet. She dismissed her scythe from Naruto's hands, before materializing it in hers.

"So, you can fight against my **double Accel**?" She asked. "Well, I'll have to be serious with you then." And she attacked again, this time moving much faster than before... This time Naruto couldn't dodge the swing of her scythe completely and it cut a couple of strands of his hair... Knowing that he was far too outmatched in terms of speed, he decided that using tier two against Arnett was more than reasonable.

"**Kyuumon: kai!**" The redhead, who was trying to attack him again, was blown away by the blast of energy that was produced when Naruto opened the second gates. While she was still recovering, he attacked her, moving with the speed almost equal to that of her **double Accel**. She dodged it, using her **triple Accel**, though it was harder than she expected, and tried to counterattack. The blond shinobi felt her coming and leaned out of the way of her weapon, before catching her by her left wrist and throwing her against the ground with enough power to create some dust clouds, before drawing a kunai he had hidden in his right sleeve and placing it against girl's neck.

"I win." Naruto stated simply, while looking at Yumi-sensei. The Korean Pandora nodded and announced him as a winner, while he closed his inner gates before it drained him too much: no matter how it looked like during the fight, Arnett was strong and it took quite a lot out of him to keep up with her.

* * *

There was another couple of fight, with one being between ranks three and five. The girls put an impressive fight, but in the end zanbatou-wielding rank three, Ticy Phenyl, won against rank five, Creo Brand, whose weapon was a couple of gauntlets.

"I think, sensei, I'm up for another spar." Naruto said, once Yumi Kim had announced the end of the previous match... She looked at him for a couple of very long seconds, before finally nodding slowly: Elize did tell her that he was a stamina freak, and did have enough strength to keep up with the ranks two and one, so she had little problem in allowing him to have another fight.

"Very well, if you want." The Korean Pandora said. "Elizabeth will be your opponent for this spar." The aristocratic girl, that was the leader of the group that tried to corner him yesterday, stepped into the arena circle... Naruto though wasn't joining her there just yet. He removed his sage cloak instead.

"Hold it for me, please." He said, addressing to Ticy – she seemed to be the most approachable among the girls. Even ever-smiling Chiffon was harder to approach... The brunette nodded and took the cloak from him. "Thank you." Making a spectacle of loosening his muscles, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki joined his opponent on the arena.

"If you're ready... Hajime." Yumi announced, before getting away from the 'arena': this fight was going to be quite destructive, she could feel it. And she didn't want to be too close to it, unless that was absolutely necessary... Elizabeth instantly materialized her weapon: a pair of octahedral devices she called 'Stigma Satellite System', and blocks of semi-transparent bluish energy around her hands to act as shields. Naruto on the other hand remained motionless as he was for the past four seconds, though orange rings were now surrounding his eyes.

"What's that? A makeup?" Elizabeth asked. Instead of replying verbally, the young sage just opened his eyes. Those now were golden-yellow and had horizontal rectangular pupils, like those were eyes of a toad...

"Side effect of activating tier three, otherwise know as the 'sage mode'." He said, his voice a bit lower than normal. "Feel honored, you are the fourth to ever force me to use it outside of training." The blond Pandora huffed and had her 'satellites' aim at him. A moment later they fired energy beams, but thanks to his amplified sensor skills, Naruto felt the attack coming and evaded it. Or at least he had evaded the first blast: the satellites were able to track him, and one of the beams touched his hand, cutting some phalanges from a couple of his fingers... Seeing that she had hurt him badly, Elizabeth stopped her satellites and was ready to rush to him to help, but was shocked to see his flesh and bone regenerating rapidly.

"Um... Sorry?" She said, not sure what to feel about this. Sure, there were Pandora with a similar ability, but for a _human_ to possess a regeneration on this level was something unheard of...

"Nah, lived through worse." Naruto replied, before dashing towards her: she was not an opponent to fight from a distance. Elizabeth, of course, tried to stop him with her satellites' fire, but the Kyuubi jinchuuriki was dodging those beams well as he got closer and closer to her... The blond Pandora saw him coming and gracefully evaded his palm strike, or so she thought, as a moment later it something that felt like a ram hit her stomach, making her do step back. This almost cost her the match, as Naruto was attacking again. Again, even if she dodged his palm strike, something still hit her, this time sending her flying backwards good two dozen meters... Still, she managed to recover in the air and land on her feet.

"What was that?" She asked as soon as came to a stop.

"Ah... That's an extended reach I gain while using the sage mode." Naruto replied cheerfully. "And it gives me stone skin as well, so taijutsu isn't useful against me." Elizabeth swore in her mind: winning against this guy without resorting to potentially lethal force would be really hard. And with how powerful his attacks were, that would be even harder... But she will fight him and fight for the victory.

Naruto's next attack forced her on defensive, but with some **triple Accel**, she managed to put some distance between herself and her opponent for her satellites to operate without problems. The Kyuubi jinchuuriki tried to get closer to her, but Elizabeth didn't let him to. She was trying to outlast him: without this sage mode he wasn't strong enough to beat her, and she could see that its powers were dwindling, if the rings around his eyes were of any indication... Naruto, of course, knew that his time in the sage mode was coming to an end, so he switched the tactic: he got as close to his opponent as he could, before punching the ground with all his might...

Before Elizabeth could consciously wonder why he'd do that, she felt it – Naruto created a tremor powerful enough to make her lose concentration over her satellites in attempt to keep her balance... And he used this distracting to dash towards her, hoping to end the match with the next attack. The blond Pandora threw an energy shield in front of her, but it was not nearly enough to stop Naruto, as he easily destroyed her defenses and palmed her just under her ribs, sending her flying way out of the ring.

"...Winner, Namikaze-san." Yumi-sensei said after a long pause... Once the blond dimensional traveler left the arena (after he patched the damage he had done with that punch of his up), she announced the next match, the one between two weakest Pandora of the year... And as soon as the fight started, she approached Naruto, who had already taken his cloak from Ticy, but was yet to put it back on. "Can I ask you something?" The Kyuubi jinchuuriki nodded. "Well, I actually want to ask two things... First, how did you do those ...hm, repairs to the arena?"

"Ninjutsu. Earth element to be precise. Elize-sensei should have told you that I can do things like that... But let me tell you this: ninjutsu are my primary fighting method, taijutsu comes second. What I did back there was a really minor technique. I know and can do far more destructive ones." The Korean Pandora stared at him: he had just defeated three Pandora, two of whom were from the top five of the third year, and, according to him, he wasn't even going all out.

"That's a lot to take in..." She said. "But, anyway, the second question I wanted to ask you was about your regeneration."

"I see..." Naruto replied. "Yes, do possess regeneration far beyond that of a normal human. Part of it comes from my bloodline, and the other... it's the side effect of my condition." He said cryptically. "I can't regenerate anything that my body doesn't have resources for, so regrowing limbs is out of question. Reattaching, though, should be possible."

"Are you really human?" A whipped-looking Elizabeth – apparently, her landing after his last strike wasn't nice – asked as she approached them, while looking at him accusingly.

"Human is but a state of mind. So, yes, I'm human." Naruto replied, causing a tick mark appear on blond Pandora's forehead. She tried to punch him, but the Kyuubi jinchuuriki slapped her fist away with the back of his hand. "And we've already found out that today I can defeat you. Wait a bit for a rematch, will you." Yumi was about to scold her for attacking a 'classmate' outside the spar, but instead had to go announce the victor of the next match.

"I'm the last one..." Chiffon, who was standing next to her closest friend, Ticy, said. Indeed, she didn't have partner for the spar.

"Well, I can do that." Naruto suggested. The brown-haired ever-smiling girl looked at him a bit curiously: she had seen his regeneration in work, and she had seen how much stamina he did possess, but she still wasn't sure that he was up to a fight against her. Still, it wasn't her place to tell him what to do and what not to do.

"If you are sure..." She trailed off, as she headed to the ring. Naruto, after giving his cloak back to Ticy, followed her... The Korean Pandora watched as the two of them took their places on the inside of the ring. She had seen what Naruto was capable of, so, despite what she thought about him going against the strongest – it was an openly-known secret of the academy that Chiffon was at least on the same level with the 'professors' – Pandora out there, she had no reason to prevent this match from happening.

"Hajime!" Yumi-sensei announced, before getting the hell away from the two: there was no doubt in her mind that their fight will be by far the most destructive one, and she really didn't want to be caught by any of their techniques... Chiffon instantly dashed towards Naruto, materializing her weapon – a huge gauntlet, as long as she was tall, with twenty inches long claws – as she went: she needed to reach him before he enters that sage mode of his...

The blond shinobi sensed her coming, and between saving his life and entering sage mode, he chose his life. Still, with just his basic abilities, he lacked the natural speed required to dodge the incoming attack... Well, it looked like it was about the time he began using ninjutsu and showed how shinobi fight.

"What the?.." Chiffon asked when instead of her opponent her claws connected with a cloud of smoke. Turning around, she saw another one, a bit bigger, with Naruto crouched inside it. There also were two mice running away from there, but she paid them no mind... When the smoke finally disappeared, she could see that her attack managed to connect with him somehow – five cuts on his torso that went through his armor could attest to that.

"You're good." Naruto said. "But I do not need my sage mode to use ninjutsu." He was forced to jump to the side then, as Chiffon attacked. He barely dodged the first swing of her gauntlet, but wasn't as lucky with the second, as it left a cut on his left cheek... Not giving her a chance to continue attacking, he used **shunshin** to get to the other side of the arena.

"Hm..." The brown-haired Pandora replied, before attacking again... But before she could reach him, Naruto somehow – she was sure that he didn't have five seconds of standing still he said he needed for this – entered his sage mode and when she got closer, he produced a shockwave of pure chakra that blew the brown-haired Pandora away. While she was still airborne, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki appeared next to her, and tried to punch her. Chiffon, of course, blocked his attack with her gauntlet, but it took a lot of damage from it, as several cracks appeared on its surface.

Quickly repairing her gauntlet, the ever-smiling girl tried to attack Naruto again, moving at the highest speed she could achieve while using **triple Accel**. In response to her attack, the blond sage create a whitish ball of energy in the palm of his right hand. When she got close to him, he let the ball of chakra explode outwards, unleashing a powerful wind that again sent the brown-haired Pandora flying away... This time though, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki didn't go after her and, instead, placed both his hands on the ground. A moment later a mass of stone spikes rose from the ground in place where she would land... In an incredible display of acrobatics, Chiffon managed to land between those spikes without taking more damage than a couple of scratches...

Still, while she was making sure that her landing would not cost her her 'life', she lost the sight of her opponent, and now she was facing a huge boulder – about three meters in diameter – flying towards her. Jumping to the side (and getting some cuts on her legs in process), the brown-haired Pandora dodged the projectile, only to land on the blunt tip of an earthen pillar that was rising from the ground. Unable to keep her balance, the girl jumped off the pillar.

As soon as she was again standing on the solid ground, she had to jump into the air, as Naruto made a dragon head made of stone explode from under the ground and tried to bite her. Immediately, another two beasts rose from the ground and went after her. Swearing under her breath, Chiffon used **tempest turn** to create an illusionary copy of herself in hopes that Naruto will attack it and not her. Too bad, he was a sensor while in the sage mode, so he could distinguish which was the real one and sent his attacks after her...

Landing on top of one of the Chinese-looking dragons, the brown-haired Pandora slashed it with her claws, destroying it. The second one, though, rammed into her, sending her crashing into the ground. Still, the 'dragon' moved too slow to reach her before she had recovered and it was destroyed as well... While she was busy dealing with the stone dragons, Chiffon didn't notice the earth rising around her feet and shackling her down... Meanwhile Naruto pulled another huge boulder from under the ground and threw it at the immobilized Pandora, who finally noticed that she couldn't move away from the spot... And had no time to free herself with her gauntlet, lest she accidentally cut herself badly.

"Oh well..." She sighed, before energy exploded out of her body, shattering the stone that held her in place. A bluish aura surrounded her, while her hair changed into white and, though no one could see that, her eyed turned golden, while her gauntlet grew in size and became more demonic in its appearance... Evading the wind attack Naruto had thrown at her, Chiffon dashed towards her opponent with the greatest speed she could produce: she had only three minutes to win this match, and she was sure that the blond shinobi in front of her was running low on the powers he was granted by his sage mode...

But Naruto wasn't done yet, and, having sensed her coming, he dodged the swing of her clawed gauntlet, before sending a blast of wind to her back. The brown-haired Pandora somehow managed to evade, even though the attack was almost point blank, and counterattacked, only for the Kyuubi jinchuuriki to redirect her strike with an armored guard on the back of his hand, while making a palm thrust towards her heart... The strike never connected with her though, as the blond stopped it at the last moment.

"Forfeit." He said, while letting her feel the amount of energy concentrated around his palm: it was enough for the thrust to be fatal even for a Pandora using her Pandora mode. Knowing that there was nothing she could do in the situation like this, Chiffon lowered her head and, exiting her Pandora mode, disintegrated her volt weapon.

"I forfeit." She said finally, causing other Pandora to whisper among themselves: who would have thought that the 'smiling monster' was capable of losing a battle?.. Naruto removed his palm from her heart and let the energy he had there dissipate. Then he whistled.

"Damn... I practically destroyed this stadium. Oh well..." Making a concatenation handseal, he forced the ground to return to its original state. With both of his shadow clones already dispersed, he was done there. "Sensei, shouldn't you, you know, call the match?" Yumi nodded hastily.

"Winner of this match is Namikaze-san." Naruto just shrugged and went to retrieve his cloak from Ticy, while thinking how he could repair his armor vest and his sweater: reinforced steel and titanium fishnet didn't seem to be sold freely in this world...

* * *

That's all folks  
leave me a **Review**!


	3. Goddess in a tank

Here's the newest chapter for the "_**Antifreeze fox**_" story. Enjoy!

*** Review response**:  
**Junky**, **kuroneko215**, replied you via PM.  
**ebm6969**, rasengan is not a technique to be used in a friendly spar. Much like chidori/raikiri.  
**puma1sunfire**, **Dark Insomniacs**, **Psudocode Samurai**, **fanficreader71**, **BattleCharger**, **Liger01**, **Beginning and the End**, **Still Not Dead Yet**, **Orchamus**, **Elemental Dragon Swordman**, **Cloves**, **bakapervert**, thank you for your reviews, folks!  
**zrodeathwing**, ummm? not sure what you wanted to say in the last part of your review... but maybe it's just my brain being fried by the exams I have.  
**Phibriglex**, well free food and free lodging evens things out a bit, don't they?  
**Kuro009**, looks like that pairing will win - the threesome is voted by 74% + 13% don't care about pairing.

*** Jutsu list**: **Shinobi techniques**:  
**Shunshin** - (D-rank) body flicker technique - short-range teleportation.  
**Kage bunshin** - (A-rank) shadow clone technique - creates solid copies of a user.  
**Fuuton: resenshuriken** - (S-rank) wind style: spiral shuriken - rasengan infused with wind chakra. highly destructive, but when used point blank instead of being thrown, does damage to the wielder as well.  
**Colossal rasengan** - (sage arts) colossal spiral sphere - big rasengan made of sage chakra.  
**Senpou: doton: gamajoudai teikoku heki** - (sage arts) earth style: guardian toad imperial wall - creates a really big stone wall.  
**Kyuumon: kai** - (? rank) gates of life: release - opens second inner gates.  
*** Jutsu list**: **Pandora-Limiter techniques**:  
**Erienbar set** - initiates the sharing of senses between the Pandora and her Limiter(s). Required for the Limiter(s) to use **Freezing** technique.  
**Freezing** - Limiter locally negates the Freezing field of Nova and (stronger ones) deploy their own freezing field.  
**Accel turn** - increases speed of a Pandora. 5x acceleration allows one to move with a speed close to sound barrier. Not all Pandora can use this technique.  
**Tempest turn** - 'cloning' through sheer speed. So far the shown limit is 10 copies. Not all Pandora can use this technique.

*** Poll**: Who doesn't know yet, there is a poll about the pairing for this story posted in my profile. The options are: Naruto/Maria or Naruto/Maria/Amelia. Poll will be closed when I publish the next chapter.

*** AN**: Speaking of the next chapter... this one is the last pre-written, so there will be no stable weekly updates anymore. Or any scheduled ones... I will post the fourth chapter as soon as it is finished, though.

* * *

**Disclaimer**: I DO NOT own "_**Naruto**_" or "_**Freezing**_". No profit is being made. Oh, and I borrowed some names from other anime & manga. I don't own those either.

"speaking"  
'_thinking_'  
"**speaking of the higher beings** / **jutsu** / **speaking in power ****mode**"  
'_**thinking of the higher beings**_'

* * *

**chapter III: Goddess in a tank**

At Yumi's insistence, Elize-sensei had Elizabeth and Chiffon assist her when she ran tests on Naruto's sage mode the next morning: after all, both girls had experienced those powers of his firsthand... But aside from increased neural activity in the parts of brain that were processing sensory information and slight shifts in his 'aura', the green-haired nurse could detect nothing that would give her more information on the sage mode.

So, in the afternoon Naruto had to do some outdoor tests. Needless to say that the four Pandora were in awe of the physical strengths the sage mode granted – the biggest problem the Kyuubi jinchuuriki had with lifting a hundred tons boulder was actually picking it up... **Rasenshuriken** too was quite an impressing move...

Then Elize had him have another spar with Elizabeth and then with Chiffon to have more accurate estimation of his power. The blond Pandora still couldn't win, though, this time she managed to force Naruto to use senpou ninjutsu against her (she herself was forced to use both **Accel turn** and **Tempest turn** to her limits to achieve that). Chiffon, on the other hand, pushed him hard, forcing him to reactivate his sage mode twice via his clones – the 'smiling monster' still couldn't see through his **kage bunshin** plus **henge** combination to get his clones away from the battlefield to gather natural energies – while she herself didn't need Pandora mode this time... The fight ended in a draw with their weapons (in Naruto's case – giant kunai) at each others necks.

And it was like that only because had used some ninjutsu he hadn't shown yesterday: the blond sage was openly admitting that Chiffon will be winning against him all the time once he ran out of new tricks... But as Elizabeth couldn't win against him, he was given the 1½ rank among the third years. Naruto just shrugged at that: it was not like he cared about this type of ranking anymore – he had outgrown that orange-wearing attention-seeking loudmouth brat he was in the shinobi academy.

**~/ *** \~**

As the days were quite and there were no Nova attacks anywhere, Naruto decided to train some more, mostly in hopes of 'optimizing' his sage mode to be more effective while in the freezing field – right now he was wasting about twenty five percents of his strength to force his way through the field – the Kyuubi jinchuuriki sought out his 'classmate', Kazuya Aoi, out.

"Aoi-san, can I ask you for some help this afternoon?" The blond sage asked while the first years were heading to the mess for some lunch... The dark-haired teen looked at him.

"Yeah, sure. What do you need, Naruto-san?" He asked. Naruto shrugged.

"Just some training of mine, and it requires someone with the ability to use **freezing**. You seemed to be my best choice as I wouldn't have to trouble your Pandora as well for this." Kazuya nodded: it looked like a good idea on Naruto's side... Plus he himself needed to practice his gift, as for the time being he will have to use it on his own: Satelizer-senpai was warming towards him, but it was still a long time before she'll be ready to perform baptism with him.

The afternoon lectures passed without any interesting events, and soon the two found themselves on one of the stadiums that surrounded the dormitories of the West Genetics.

"What do you need me to do, Naruto?" Kazuya asked. Instead of replying now, Naruto became completely motionless for several seconds as he entered his sage mode. The dark-haired boy, having seen this _transformation_ already, was not much surprised by the red rings appearing around the blond's eyes.

"As you know, I can create a solid doppelgangers." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki started from afar. At his 'partners' nod, he created a single **kage bunshin**, which was in the sage mode as well. "He will be observing my 'progress'." Naruto said as his clone got a dozen meters away from its creator, before sitting on the ground in lotus position. "Now, I need you to place me and only me in your **freezing** field. I myself will try to tweak my tier three to work against it with minimal losses." Kazuya nodded. Extending his right hand in Naruto's direction, he called forth his powers.

"**Freezing!**" Blue hexagonal pattern appeared on the ground, and the Kyuubi jinchuuriki felt his movements being enchained by the field... Already knowing that his 'standard' sage mode was not 'optimal', the blond started slowly adjusting the ratio of energies flowing through his body – he allowed a tiny little bit more natural energy in. This made him feel the effect of the freezing field on him lessen, but he also could feel his appearance changing into more toady one... Knowing that further increasing the amount of natural energy he was using was a risk, the blond signaled to Kazuya to stop. "Already?" He asked. Naruto shook his head.

"I'm reaching my safe limit, right?" His question directed to his shadow clone. It nodded.

"Yes, boss. While you were wasting only twenty one percent of your strength, you had thirty eight percents of natural energy in composition against you normal thirty five. Any further, I agree with you here, and we might permanently connect to the nature." Whatever that meant, it made Naruto scowl a bit.

"Any suggestion on how to improve from there?" The real blond asked.

"We might add a bit of _its_ chakra into the mix, like you did when you were facing Nagato." The clone replied. Naruto thought about it for several seconds, before nodding.

"Yeah, we should try that." Then he turned to Kazuya. "Let's try again." The dark-haired teen nodded.

"**Freezing!**" Once the freezing field was reactivated, Naruto reentered his sage mode, using his 'normal' ratio of natural energy this time. One that was done, he started slowly adding Kyuubi's yoki into the mix, making his toad-like eyes turn deep orange, while his pupils looked like crosses. Interestingly enough, the red rings around his eyes were much paler now... As he tried to move now, he found that it was easier, more so than when he was using more than normal amount of natural energy...

"This is much better." The blond sage said.

"Indeed." His clone responded. "You're wasting only eighteen percents now." Nodding to the clone, Naruto told Kazuya to drop the field for a moment: experimenting was good and all, but when dealing with such a complex mixture of energies, one needed to do some planning too... He was about to brainstorm the best ratio for the yoki, when a blond Pandora entered the stadium. This particular Pandora was unique in a sense as she wasn't wearing West Genetics uniform, opting for a long red dress and brown boots instead. And as Naruto had seen her near Kazuya often enough, he made an educated guess that she was his partner.

"Satelizer-senpai!.." The dark-haired teen greeted her. Satelizer nodded back to him, before heading straight to Naruto and his clone, looking like she was ready to summon her Volt weapon at any moment.

"May I ask, what you needed Kazuya-kun for?" She asked, looking into the (real) blond sage's eyes.

"You may." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki replied. After a short pause, he continued. "I needed some training with my sage mode against the freezing field, and your partner graciously agreed to help me." This answer seemed to satisfy the Pandora somewhat.

"Very well." She said. "But I'll be watching you." Naruto shrugged.

"As you wish... Now, of you excuse me, I have a training to do." Satelizer nodded and walked to where Kazuya was standing, taking a position to the right from him... Once the blond jinchuuriki and his clone came to an agreement about how much natural energy and how much yoki he should try using, he asked the dark-haired teen to put him in the **freezing** field again...

* * *

Another thirty minutes later, Naruto decided that it was enough for today - mostly because keeping the **freezing** field up had exhausted Kazuya quite a bit... That is not to say that the Kyuubi jinchuuriki was not satisfied with the progress he had made: he managed to decrease the power losses he experienced in the field to about fourteen percent, while his speed and strength actually grew some five percent in comparison to the 'normal' sage mode... Of course, there still was a room for improvement, but this much progress would be more than enough for now – all he needed to do was learning how to enter this state as fast as he did his 'normal' sage mode as Nova most definitely will not wait thirty seconds before attacking him.

There was another thing that picked his interest: when his clone was observing him during the experiments, it sensed a weak aura that was located somewhere underneath the laboratories of the West Genetics complex. And this signature was quite strange: it felt like a mix between normal Pandora aura, and that of a Nova... But no matter how much this aura interested him, Naruto decided that he will not go trying to find out what it was – the aura seemed to be harmless at the moment, and the local scientists had their right for keeping some secrets... But should this aura prove to be a source of problems in the future, he'd investigate it, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki decided.

**~/ *** \~**

It was four days since his 'experiments' with the sage mode, and Naruto was sitting through yet another boring lecture about the history of the clashes – why again did he need those? Sure, he didn't mind learning what his allies and his enemies in this war were, but that information could be compressed into just several hours. Not several hours a day for months...

The situation changed drastically, when an alarm siren sounded. It appeared that there was a Nova attack nearby, and the reserve of the West Genetics was mobilized. And since Naruto was in that reserve, he had to go. Not even bothering to tell the sensei that he needed out, he just used **shunshin** to get to the airfield. And, apparently, he was here so early, that the chopper wasn't even starting its engines yet, as the pilots were only running towards it... Still, two and a half minutes later, the flying machine was ready to take off, and the Nova-killing squad was assembled in it.

"According to the HQ, there are two Nova, presumably S-type, in the sea near Shintoshi. Mission is as always: destroy'em before they get to the city." The assistant pilot said, before turning around to return to his place in the cabin. Naruto, though, had a request.

"How far upwards is the **freezing field** of these Nova?" He asked: the theory lessons covered the dimensions of the fields only in horizontal plane. The pilot thought for a couple of seconds, before answering:

"Roughly one hundred meters for S-type Nova." The blond dimension-traveler nodded to himself.

"In that case, if the Novas have manifested by the time we get there, can you fly over one of them. It will save me a lot of time in fighting it." Seeing the 'are you crazy?' look on the man's face, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki added: "Don't worry, the fall won't harm me." The pilot nodded reluctantly: after all they did have to cross the harbor to get to a place where they could land, so a small detour to fly over one of the monsters wouldn't take much of their time.

* * *

It was like the 'luck' was on Naruto's side today, as by the time the chopper reached the harbor, both Novas had finished manifesting into this world. And as the pilots guided the machine to fly over one of the aliens, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki entered his sage mode. Once he was there, he summoned a single **kage bunshin** (which still shocked the Pandora and their Limiters), and used it to create a base for the **rasenshuriken** – he couldn't finish the jutsu inside of the chopper because it was too dangerous.

Using his sensor abilities, the blond shinobi chose the perfect moment for himself and his clone to jump off the chopper as it was flying over one of the Nova. And as soon as they were 'outside', they expanded the **rasenshuriken** to its full size and power. Then Naruto used a low-level wind jutsu to propel the clone towards the gigantic alien, while at the same time creating a **colossal rasengan** to finish cracking the 'armor' the Nova had over its core...

Just like the Kyuubi jinchuuriki predicted, the monster was unable to attack upwards, so his clone had no problems with delivering the **rasenshuriken** there. Moment later the clone was dispelled as the jutsu exploded against the thick armor of the Nova. Just like it was during his first fight with these monsters, the **rasenshuriken** alone was not enough to crack the armor, but the follow-up attack with a normal one (albeit huge and powered with sage chakra) was... So right now Naruto was standing on the edge of the hole in the Nova's 'armor', staring at its bluish core. Not giving the alien a chance to suck out all of his powers before he killed it, the blond shinobi gripped the surprisingly soft orb with his both hands, and then ripped it off the alien's body, before crushing it, thus killing the Nova.

Still, he had almost used up his sage mode fighting the monster, so he needed to recharge it, if he wanted to help Pandora deal with the other one. So the Kyuubi jinchuuriki **shunshin**'ed to the shore, appearing there almost at the same time with the Pandora-Limiter squads that were going to attack the second Nova. Nodding to them, the blond became motionless to gather the natural energies...

Once his sage mode was recharged, Naruto rejoined the battle. And just in time, it seemed, as everybody with a pair of eyes could tell that the Nova was preparing to unleash some kind of not-documented attack, as a glowing orb of energy could be seen in front of the monster's chest.

"**Senpou: doton: gamajoudai teikoku heki!**" The Kyuubi jinchuuriki shouted as he flashed through the handseals. A moment later a thick wall of dark stone rose from the water between the Pandora and the Nova... Then there was a blinding flash of light, and when everyone could see again, the wall was almost completely melted by whatever attack the alien entity had unleashed... Still, it had fulfilled its purpose, protecting the Pandora, and now they were attacking the Nova, before it could create another such attack.

Naruto watched with some fascination as the girls attacked the monster in a team, where some were averting its attention, while the others were destroying the armor, before one of them delivered the finishing blow to the now-naked core.

* * *

As soon as the HQ had confirmed that both Novas were destroyed, the quick response squad (Naruto and seven Pandora-Limiter teams) was allowed to return to the West Genetics... As they were en route, the pilots had received some information that was needed to know by fighters:

"It seems that East Genetics was attack too." The co-pilot said. "There were four S-types. Three were destroyed and the last one wounded, but it used some kind of a beam attack, before disappearing into the sea. At the moment there are fifteen Pandora MIA." He made a short pause. "So, boys and girls, your work for today may not be over just yet."

This caused the group's mood to spiral downwards: not only the Nova were displaying some new attack, but they also changed their behavior pattern... That, and their comrades gone MIA. But like the co-pilot said, it was too early to call it a day, as the missing Nova might just attack them (as in West Genetics) instead...

**~/ *** \~**

Unfortunately, the pilot was right, and the 'runaway' Nova had reappeared a couple of hours later in the harbor next to Shintoshi, but instead of attacking the city, like the alien monstrosities did in the past, this one went for the West Genetics instead. Along with the fifteen Pandora that went MIA a couple of hours ago as its puppets of a kind, controlled through their corroded stigmata...

The situation seemed to be so bad that the headmistress had ordered all fourth and third year Pandora and even some of the second year mobilized. The older ones were sent to the front-lines to finish the Nova off, while the younger ones stayed behind to protect the academy... Naruto was ordered to stay out of the battle and act as a coordinator, as the sensor abilities of his sage mode at the moment were needed more than his fighting skills.

And, indeed, while the devices at the HQ could sense approaching Nova from hundreds miles away, they lacked finesse to sense the flow of energy when the alien monster was charging up its attack or whatever else the beast was doing. Naruto in his sage mode, though, could...

It took him a couple of minutes, as the energy used by Nova was quite unlike the chakra he was used to, but he managed to understand how it was controlling those Pandora from East Genetics, and think of a way to break that control. Namely, one needed to destroy a stigmata crystal that grew one the centers of the Pandora's chests – Nova was issuing its control over them through these crystals.

This information allowed the Pandora defending the academy to turn the battle into their favor, but it still was not easy for them to finish the Nova off... And while the battle was still going on, Naruto had noticed one interesting thing: the Nova wasn't attacking the academy randomly – it was sending its puppets towards a certain place, to where that strange aura he had first sensed several days ago was... At that time the Kyuubi jinchuuriki didn't pay it much mind, thinking that it was (mostly) harmless, but right now he had reclassified it as a security issue: it was attracting Nova after all... And since it was a security issue, he had to investigate it. That, though, will have to wait until after the battle...

* * *

Once the Nova was dealt with, and all of the Pandora from the East Genetics it had under its control were saved, Naruto began his quest of finding out what was hidden under the laboratories that attracted the alien monsters. Normally, it would be nigh impossible for him to find a way down there, thanks to all those security measures installed, but the Nova had cleared a route for him, which was not closed yet, so after some walking, the blond jinchuuriki reached a huge cavernous chamber with some machinery against the walls and a glass tank filled with some bluish liquid attached to the wall across from the entrance. In this tank there was a crystallized body of a young woman, with some pipes and cables attached to it. Also, some parts of her body (right side of stomach and a part of left shoulder) were missing...

"Welcome to the Ravensbourne Nucleotide." The headmistress of the West Genetics, sister Margaret said, as she walked up to Naruto, who was still studying the chamber. "I think that it was indeed futile to hope that a sensor like you will not notice this place this soon." The blond looked at her.

"I take, you didn't want me to find your secret lab?" He asked. Sister Margaret shrugged

"No, not really. We just hoped that it will be some more time before you find out the dirty secret of Pandora creation." Somehow, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki was yet to see, where she was heading to with her speech.

"While I was kind of sheltered from the worst of the shinobi world, I don't think you have anything that goes too far." He replied. The headmistress was silent for several seconds, before she spoke.

"Very well... First of all, introductions are in order. This is the body of Maria Lancelot." Sister Margaret said, while pointing at the body in the tank. "You might have already heard about her during the lectures, though, commonly, her monickers are used: 'the Goddess', 'the Mother of all Pandora' or even 'the Holy corpse'." Naruto nodded: yes, during one of the lectures he had attended, someone by the monicker 'the Goddess' was mentioned.

"The last one would not be entirely correct." He said. "While her body had underwent some kind of metamorphosis to turn into a crystal, her spirit is still attached to it. That is why both I myself and the Nova can detect her... So calling her a corpse would not be correct – she, in some ways, is still alive." Sister Margaret stared at him for several seconds – it looked like she was really shocked by the revelation.

"Maria is still alive?" The headmistress of the West Genetics asked again. The blond sage shrugged.

"Kind of: it is not defined, what we can call alive, and what is dead. But I'd say that yes, she is alive... Actually, he condition might be reversible – it might be possible to bring her back."

"I'm not sure that this would be a good idea." Sister Margaret said. Naruto gave her a questioning look. "As she is right now, Maria is very important to the Pandora project... You're a sensor, you should be able to tell why yourself." The blond sage paused for a couple of seconds to think.

"Her aura lies somewhere in between those of a Nova and of an average Pandora..." He wanted to say that she was something like a jinchuuriki of sorts, but that would not explain her importance. Then he remembered that the stigmata are organic crystals... "Are you trying to say that the stigmata originate from her body?" Sister Margaret nodded.

"This is why Maria is so important to us. Without her as she is right now, we will not be able to create more Pandora to fight the Nova off." Naruto cocked his head to he side.

"Stigmata are organic crystals, it should be possible to grow them artificially in any amounts you would need... And if the stigmata are coming from Maria's body, how she was a Pandora herself?" He asked.

"And this is where the dirty secret lies." The headmistress of the West Genetics replied. "Maria isn't like modern Pandora. But to explain that, let me give you a history lesson." She made a small pause. "Back in year 2012, during the first clash, humankind had no weapon against the Nova – only because Novas can't live in Earth atmosphere for more than a day and a half we are still here. And when they 'die', they don't disintegrate, but leave a corpse behind. That is where someone got a bright idea to implant Nova flesh into a human in hopes of creating something that could stand up to the invaders. Out of almost two hundreds ...volunteers that were given Nova flesh, only fourteen years old Maria survived, and became the proto-Pandora... Eight years later, during the second clash, she was the only one who stood in the way of Novas, and she killed them all, though in the last fight, when four S-type Novas were spawned, she went over her limit, and her body turned into what you see." Sister Margaret made another pause. "Of course, even though they already had Maria, they still tried to create more, using Nova flesh, but in every case, the ...test subject died... Or was turned into a miniature Nova... When Maria 'died', the scientists decided to try using the parts of her body instead. This proved to be a success, and the modern-type Pandora were created. ...Of course, there were errors, before the process of Pandora creation was 'perfected', but when the third clash occurred, there already was an army of Pandora to defend the Earth."

"I see..." Was all that Naruto could say at the moment. A couple of seconds later, once the information more or less had settled in his head, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki continued. "But I still stand by what I have said: the stigmata can be grown artificially, and Maria is too much of an asset in the war to keep her in her current state." He made a pause. "As for the ..history of how Pandora came to be, kind of similar was the creation of jinchuuriki in my home world. The only difference is that not the flesh was combined, but the energies of the demons were sealed into humans... That, and there was only nine bijuu, and with all of them sealed, the jinchuuriki are used as weapons against other humans."

"Interesting." Sister Margaret said. "But back to Maria... While you're right here, I'm just a headmistress, so, even if my academia is the one housing 'the Goddess', I simply cannot have her revived without the approval of the Chevalier organization." After a pause, she added: "But I will contact them regarding your discovery about Maria's status. I will not promise anything, though."

**~/ *** \~**

Surprisingly enough, it took the Chevaliers only two days to make a decision regarding 'the Goddess', and the majority wanted her revived, even though there were many who were against that decision. So while Naruto was studying the process of corrosion with Elize-sensei (it was believed that it was stigmata-type corrosion that turned Maria into a crystal), the rest of those who knew about the Ravensbourne Nucleotide were collecting the stigmata from Maria's body that would be used both as the samples for the artificial-growth technology and for creation of new Pandora while that technology is under development...

It took the blond sage a week to get an idea of what exactly had happened to 'the Goddess', and that it indeed could be reversed. Actually, aside from one small issue, reviving Maria seemed to be pretty easy, so that even his limited sealing skills were enough... That minor issue was the amount of chakra that was needed to power the array – Naruto wasn't sure that he could muster enough even if he was to use sage mode with the second gates open. After some thinking, though, he decided that he will try the seal anyway.

* * *

Once the array – it took the Kyuubi jinchuuriki almost five days to draw it, as the seal was gigantic, and he needed to use a special ink for it, the one that had some of his blood in it – was complete, the tank which held 'the Goddess's' body was lowered onto the floor of the chamber. After the liquid from the tank was evacuated, and all of the machinery connected to her body was removed, Maria was placed on the center of the seal, just over the large kanji for 'life'.

"Let's begin, then." Naruto said, as he took his place at the edge of the seal, while the others present moved away to the walls of the chamber. "**Kyuumon: kai!**" Chakra, released as he opened the second gates, exploded around the blond sage, creating a small shockwave, but then settled into a bluish glowing aura around him. Closing his eyes and willing his body to become completely still, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki slowly (as working with more chakra than usual was harder) entered his sage mode. As soon as the blonde was sure that everything was OK, he pushed all of the energy he had at the moment into the seal.

For a moment it looked like nothing had happened, but then the array began glowing with a dim blue light... The amount of chakra he pushed into the array at the beginning was not enough though, as Naruto soon discovered: the seal was taking more and more from him, and even the great amounts of energy his sage mode had was not enough. So much not enough that soon chakra exhaustion washed over him. The last thing he saw before his eyes closed was bluish crystalline body of Maria regaining normal human colors...

* * *

That's all folks  
leave me a **Review**!


	4. Awakened

Damn, it was so long since I have posted anything... My inspiration seems to have gone on yet another vacation. Or not? Anyway, here's the fourth chapter of the "_**Antifreeze fox**_" story for your enjoyment.

*** Review response**:  
**karthik9**, **Orchamus**, **puma1sunfire**, **bakapervert**, **Psudocode Samurai**, **Antoinette Castellan**, **fanficreader71**, **sh8ad8ow**, **Cloves**, **nogard265**, **Stonebridge**, **Shadow of Sin 0**, **Dudtheman**, **Beginning and the End**, **Deadzepplin**, **Elemental Dragon Swordman**, **zrodeathwing**, **The Sad Reaper**, **Pedro Boncompagni**, **FenrirCrinos**, **okibikami123**, **dregus**, thanks for your reviews, folks!  
**Liger01**, please, please, please don't have me! Anyway, this chapter too ends with a cliffie.  
**7 Winds**, thanks, and there **will be** some change in the events of the Alaska arc, so... read out.  
**ebm6969**, from a normal rasengan maybe, but a sage one... not sure if it even can be downpowered that it is not a one-shot-kill move.  
**Alphawolfy288**, I will borrow the term 'Editor' (you don't mind, right?), but I already have chosen the effect he will have on the bound Pandora. Also, the word-mail you mentioned sounds like a reyvateil's magic from "_**Ar tonelico**_".  
**5-digit**, Naruto's main edge in the fights in this universe is his set of skills (how different it from either Pandora or Nova attacks) - once his opponent is familiar with his tricks, his chances of winning really go down. Still with his sage mode, he is on the same level as Elizabeth. Chiffon is stronger than him, as any other Pandora of the similar strength would be (once they know how he fights, of course).  
**CthuluSatellite**, it still can turn into that, but so far it looks like the story will have a threesome... People like threesomes. Maybe 'cause they can't have'em themselves...  
**PurplePulsar**, eat, my dear follower =)  
**fragglemaster**, I should update "_**Harry Potter: the Serpent Lord**_" sometime this week. Been silent there for long enough.  
**Radomir's Renegades**, replied you via PM.

*** Jutsu list**: **Shinobi techniques**:  
**Kage bunshin** - (A-rank) shadow clone technique - creates solid copies of a user.  
*** Jutsu list**: **Pandora-Limiter techniques**:  
**Erienbar set** - initiates the sharing of senses between the Pandora and her Limiter(s). Required for the Limiter(s) to use **Freezing** technique.

*** Poll**: The poll about the pairing of the story is still running. I will close it with the next chapter.  
So far, 94 votes (73%) are for the threesome, while another 20 voters (15%) don't care.

*** A question**: Does anyone know, what happened to the profile page? I can't get the links there anymore - they are changed into simple text, when I'm viewing my profile (in the editor, the links are still links).

* * *

**Disclaimer**: I DO NOT own "_**Naruto**_" or "_**Freezing**_". No profit is being made. Oh, and I borrowed some names from other anime & manga. I don't own those either.

"speaking"  
'_thinking_'  
"**speaking of the higher beings** / **jutsu** / **speaking in power ****mode**"  
'_**thinking of the higher beings**_'

* * *

**chapter IV: Awakened**

Naruto groaned as he returned to the world of consciousness: his head felt like it was splitting and his entire body was aching and felt as heavy as lead... He didn't need a medic-nin next to him to know that he had suffered a severe chakra exhaustion. Maybe he really should have used chakra-accumulating seals to help him power the main one up. Oh well, it was too late now for those thoughts...

"How am I, doc?" The blond shinobi asked in a slightly raspy voice as he lifted his head off the pillow. A glass of water from the table next to his bed really helped him there... Just as he finished drinking, Elize, who until now was busy in the next room, walked into his.

"Already up?" She asked back. "I'd advise that you stay in bed for another day or two, you've suffered a severe exhaustion, after all." The green-haired Pandora paused for a moment. "With how you are different from us, there was little I could do to help you – you are recovering on your own here." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki nodded: even back in Elemental Nations the most severe cases of chakra exhaustion had to be overcome without the side help, as foreign chakra in that case would do more harm than good.

"And for how long I was unconscious?" The blonde asked then, wanting to know how much time did pass since his attempt to revive Maria.

"Little more than two days." Elize replied, while she kept checking indications from the various devices the monitored his condition... Naruto sighed: for him to spend two days unconscious was unheard of – that seal must have drained him almost dry of chakra to have that kind of effect. He really should have used chakra-accumulating seals... "But from what I see..." The medic continued. "You've mostly recovered. I think I can even let you go if you promise not to strain yourself too much the next couple of days." But Naruto wasn't a child anymore, and his sage training had shown him when he should strain himself and when he shouldn't – things like that come naturally when you connect with yourself and the nature around you.

"Yeah, that would be nice." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki replied: he still disliked the sterile atmosphere of hospitals. The green-haired Pandora nodded and began disconnecting those monitoring devices from him. Once she was done, she crossed the room and, taking his things from the wardrobe there, returned them to the blonde sag. "And how's our 'Goddess'?" He asked, once he was dressed up.

"We keep her in a separate room for now, but as far as I can say, she's, well, alive. In every meaning of this word. At the moment she's unconscious and we're not sure when she will wake up, though, it's not likely before the end of the week..." Elize replied as she and Naruto walked towards the room where Maria was. She didn't open the door there, but through the small window the blond could see the woman – she was a bit over twenty years old and had waist-long fiery-orange slightly-wavy hair. Since her eyes were closed, it was impossible to say what color those were. On Maria's left shoulder (that was pretty much the only part of her body, aside from her face, that Naruto could see) there were bandages covering the place from where stigmata were taken... Absentmindedly, the blonde also noted that 'the Goddess' must have quite an impressive bust, judging by the bumps of the blanket over her chest...

Even though the Kyuubi jinchuuriki couldn't activate his sage mode to evaluated the condition of the redhead at the moment, he still could say that most likely Elize-sensei was right in her assessment: Maria won't be waking up soon as her body still needed time to finish healing itself, especially with the 'wounds' caused by stigmata harvests.

"I see..." The blond shinobi said. "Now then, if you don't mind, I'd like to go get something to eat – I'm really hungry, and it's almost dinner time anyway." The green-haired Pandora nodded, telling him that it was OK to leave the hospital 'wing'.

**~/ *** \~**

The next two days were the most boring for Naruto as he could do no training – he had to wait for his body to completely recover from the chakra exhaustion – or even sparring that didn't require chakra, so, all that he could do was attending lectures with the first year students of the academy... And, much like it was before, most of these lectures were very boring for the blond shinobi, even if he did his best not to show that.

And what was even worse, by the time the Kyuubi jinchuuriki was sure it was safe for him to use chakra again, Kazuya had left the academy for a two-weeks long trip with his 'senpai', so Naruto had to fall back on some other Limiter, if he wanted to do some training in the **Freezing field**. And since only Kazuya could produce it without entering **Erienbar set** with his Pandora...

To his luck, though, Chiffon agreed to talk to her Limiter, Eugene, about this. And in the next morning the brown-haired Pandora told him that she and Eugene will help him with his training. Under the condition that she is to have a spar with him. The blond sage, of course, agreed.

The spar had happened that very day in the evening, and ended in Chiffon's victory, though, the girl had to work really hard for it as Naruto's new 'mode' proved to be very strong and challenging. If you ignore the fact that the Kyuubi jinchuuriki still need almost half a minute to enter it...

The day after that was Saturday, and with no classes he needed to attend, the young sage went straight to the medical facilities as he wanted to see if Maria was showing any signs that she will be waking up soon.

Of course, Elize wasn't letting anyone other that herself into the room where 'the Goddess' lay, and, while the machines she used to monitor redhead's state showed that she was improving, it was still hard to say when Maria will wake up. But, since Naruto didn't need to enter that room to 'see' what was going on with the revived proto-Pandora, the green-haired doctor saw no reason to forbid him from entering his sage mode and evaluating Maria's current condition.

Since 'the Goddess' was a truly special being, the only one of her kind on the entire planet, Naruto didn't knew for sure what was 'normal' for her, but assuming that she was more or less similar to the modern Pandora, he came to a conclusion that, while her wounds will still take some time to heal, Maria herself will be baking up in two-three days.

This information seemed to please Elize very much, though, Naruto was sure he saw a gleam of a mad scientist in her eyes for a moment. On the second thought... He himself wouldn't mind doing some research on her.

Damn, he again sounded so much like Jiraya!..

**~/ *** \~**

A pair of yellowish-green eyes slowly opened, before closing again a moment later, blinded by a bright light in the room. A couple of the seconds later, the eyes opened again, this time a bit more adjusted to the light... She was in a hospital – this was something Maria could perceive even with how out of place she felt in her own body.

Well, since she was in a hospital, it meant that while something went wrong in her last battle, it didn't go that wrong – if they did, there wouldn't be a hospital. Calmed down a bit by that thought, the redhead tried to assess the damage done to her body. First of all, it felt so damn weak: she wasn't sure she had strength to even lift a finger; and it also felt so stiff, like she had been petrified or something... And then there were the missing chunks of flesh – one on the right side of her stomach, one on her left hip and one on her left arm. These surprised her a bit as Novas normally didn't inflict this type of damage as far she knew...

At that moment the door into the room opened, and a woman with greenish hair, dressed in a doctor's robes, entered. Even in her current state, Maria could feel that this woman was quite powerful and her powers were somewhat similar to her own. Was the program restarted without her getting a wind of it? Well, at the moment this didn't matter...

"I see you're awake, Maria-sama. How are you feeling?" The nurse asked. "Want to drink some water?" 'The Goddess' managed a groan that could be interpreted as a positive answer. Nodding, the green-haired woman lifted Maria into a sitting position and brought a glass of clear water to her mouth. Once the redhead finished drinking, the nurse laid her back on the bed... Maria wanted to ask what had happened to her, and the green-haired woman could understand that just from her face. "Rest now, Maria-sama. Your questions will be answered when you're feeling better." Sure, the first Pandora didn't like this much – she was used to getting information (any many other things) right away – but seeing that she couldn't even speak properly at the moment, she had to agree with the nurse there. Especially since she was already feeling like going back to sleep, despite being awake for less than five minutes...

**~/ *** \~**

When Maria woke up again, she was feeling much better. Though, she still felt too weak to leave the bed. At least it looked like she could now speak more or less normally... Then she noticed that she wasn't alone in the room. And the green-haired nurse wasn't the only 'guest' there. There also were a woman in her late thirties dressed much like a christian nun, a teenage brown-haired smiling girl in purplish school uniform and a blond teen in strange set of clothes, complete with an armor vest and a cloak. Somehow, even if both parties wanted to say something, no words were spoken for several long seconds...

"Welcome back to the world of living, Maria-sama." Sister Margaret finally said. "I'm sure that you have many questions, and we will do out best to answer them." Again there was a silence, as the redhead was trying to decide what she should ask first. A couple of seconds later, though, she had made her mind.

"What had happened during my last battle with Novas?" 'The Goddess' asked. After all, her current condition was (in her thoughts) a direct consequence of that... The headmistress of the West Genetics Academy nodded, before replying:

"None of us can be sure about that, but the evidence we have suggests that your powers went out of control and caused your body to... well, shut down." Maria nodded, accepting the answer, though it was obvious that there was more to that event that was shared with her. Now that she more or less knew what had happened to her, she needed to know where she was and who these people in front of her were. And the later seemed to be a bit more important... So she asked just that. "I'm sister Margaret, current headmistress of the West Genetics academy." The woman in nun's robes introduced herself, making 'the Goddess' frown a little: she had never heard about such an academy...

"Elize Schmitz, former member of Chevaliers and the medical officer of the academy." Chevalier organization was founded just after the first clash, so Maria was well aware of them – she herself had been fighting for them...

"Chiffon Fairchild." The brown-haired girl introduced herself with a bow. "It a honor to meet you, Maria-sama." The final member of the four, though, thought that girl's introduction wasn't complete enough and cut in.

"She's also the student council president of the academy and the strongest Pandora in training there." Elize sent a glare at the blond teen, who just shrugged in response. "What, she has the right to know." He said to the green-haired doctor, before returning his attention back to the redhead, who now was trying to wrap her mind around the idea that now there were _many_ Pandora. "Anyway, I'm Uzumaki Naruto and I'm just a tag along there." The Chiffon girl wanted to add something to the blonde's introduction, but Maria spoke before she could say something:

"You said Pandora? Last time I checked, I was the only one." 'The Goddess' said, hoping to get some information about what was going on out there.

"You were." Sister Margaret confirmed with a nod. "But things have changed since then."

"For example, the year on the calendar." The blonde, Naruto, cut in once more. "It is now like forty five years since you last battle." This time he was glared by both sister Margaret and Elize.

"Please forgive him for his rudeness, Maria-sama." The headmistress of the West Genetics said. "But he is right, it's been a little more than forty five years since your last battle during the second clash... Since then a new technology for Pandora creation was introduced." The woman paused as she was trying to decide what she should say next.

"So... There are other Pandora out there now?" 'The Goddess' asked, sounding like her entire world was destroyed – after all, unlike before, she was just one of the many now... Sister Margaret just nodded. Though Maria forced herself to remain strong on the outside, she suddenly lost any desire to speak with these (or any) people for the moment... Thankfully, the visitors understood this and quietly left the room...

**~/ *** \~**

The change of times that Maria was made aware of hit her hard – the redhead was so used to being the only Pandora, that learning that it wasn't so anymore sent her into a depression, and for the next couple of days she retired into her shell, communicating only with Elize. Out of necessity, as the green-haired ex-Pandora was her doctor...

But 'the Goddess' was strong, and soon she began to open up to others again. To Elize and Chiffon first, and with the help of the later – to sister Margaret. Naruto, though, on orders of the headmistress, was kept away from Maria for now, no matter how much the blond jinchuuriki disagreed with this decision... So to burn his irritation off (and also still having nothing else to do), the young sage was now training twice as much as he usually did.

This had one interesting side-effect, though: the stadium, where he was doing his training, could be seen from the windows of medical wing, and thus Maria could sometimes see him... No, she was too proud to admit it out aloud, but many of the things the blond was doing impressed her. A lot. And actually changed her opinion about him a bit: at first she thought about him like a waste of space – 'just a tag along', like he had described himself – but with the powers he was displaying... It was possible that the Chiffon girl didn't lie, and this guy had really taken out a Novas on his own. And the fact that it was him, who revived her...

And when one day she saw him moving in a **freezing field** deployed by a limiter like it was nothing, Maria finally decided that she should get to know this Naruto person – since now it was customary for a Pandora to have a partner, she'd need one too... And hers most definitely wouldn't be with someone who can't fight for his own hand; she needed not a normal Limiter (especially since, according to both Elize and Chiffon, she couldn't even have one as she was rather different from modern Pandora) who'd be much dependent on her, but someone strong on his own.

**~/ *** \~**

It was a more that two weeks since she first woke up, and only now Elize deemed Maria ready to leave hospital. Of course, 'the Goddess' still wasn't fully heaved from her wounds and could barely move on her own at the moment – she had to use crutches most of the time, even if loathed showing her weakness like this – but she no longer needed to stay in the medical ward... Of course, at first they wanted her to share an apartment with Elize, but Maria said 'no' to this: her pride didn't allow her to depend on others more than was absolutely necessary, and she was sure she could manage living on her own.

The next morning after her release, the revived Pandora, once again cursing in her mind her need to rely on crutches, headed to the mess to get some breakfast: while she was given her own apartment like she wanted to, at the moment there was nothing to eat there – she'll have to do some shopping later.

Like one could expect, the mess was full of students who were having their breakfast before their first lessons. Still almost as soon as Maria entered, the chatter stopped and pretty much everyone was now looking at her. It was pretty rare for a new Pandora, who wasn't to be a first-year, to appear at the academy... A moment later chatter resumed, though now students were making guesses of who Maria was... The redhead herself, being used to getting a lot of attention, just ignored them completely.

Instead, 'The Goddess' headed to get herself some food, while Chiffon sped there to help her – able to live on her own or not, Maria still would have troubles caring her own tray to the tables: she needed her hands free for crutches... And it happened so the revived Pandora decided to sit with the people she already knew, instead of occupying a free table for just herself.

"Good morning." Naruto greeted the redhead. "They discharged you from hospital? I wasn't informed 'bout that." Maria nodded him (and others) a greeting but didn't bother to answer the question, all of her attention concentrated on her meal... While Naruto and Chiffon – the only ones who knew who Maria really was – didn't pay her much mind, the rest of the people at the table were curious about who this red-haired woman was.

"Is this a friend of yours? I don't believe we're introduced." Satellizer asked. Rana and their common object of affection, one Kazuya Aoi, nodded in agreement, as did Eugene. The Kyuubi jinchuuriki looked at Chiffon, silently asking her, whether they should tell them or not... 'The Goddess', though, solved that problem for them.

"Maria Elizabeth Lancelot." The redhead said, while still focusing on her meal. The reactions were quite funny, actually, Naruto had to admit, for normally cold and collected ms. Bridget dropped her fork, while the both Rana and Eugene froze with their mouths open... Kazuya, on the other hand, had another form of a reaction:

"You are... mmph!.." The blond sage put his hand over his mouth, before the boy could shout to the entire mess that the living legend was there – for some reason, for how well known Maria was, barely anyone could recognize her by her looks.

"Tss... While I doubt that she'll mind the attention, do you want our table to be mobbed?" The Kyuubi jinchuuriki asked, before adding: "But, yes, she is." Then Naruto backed off from the dark-haired boy next to him. Surprisingly enough, Kazuya seemed to have nothing else to say or ask at the moment – and the same was true for the others – maybe it was an overwhelming presence of a legend next to him, which removed any questions from his mind? Meanwhile, Maria, who was getting close to finishing her meal, was already making a mental list of things she needed to buy for her apartment – thankfully her accounts were only frozen after her 'death', and now she had quite a sum to spend...

"You." She said, while looking at the young sage. "You are to assist me with my shopping today." She said in a commanding tone. Naruto's first reaction was to tell her to sod off – even being a shinobi, he didn't like being ordered around – but after he thought about it a little bit... He didn't want to spend the day listening to the boring lectures, and he still needed to properly repair his attire after his first spar with Chiffon; maybe he'll be able to find the things he needed for that in the town? Plus, since it was him, who revived Maria, he kind of felt that he was responsible for her while she was still recovering...

"Very well." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki replied. "We'll meet in an hour and a half in front of the academy's railway station." The redhead was silent for several moments, but in the end she agreed to this condition.

**~/ *** \~**

Maria proved to be not very talkative during the train ride (the choppers were reserved for actual Chevaliers and Pandora-Limiter teams that had missions) from the academy to Shintoshi city. But then again, seeing that she was still adapting to her second life – and the one in a different time – Naruto was sure that there was nothing wrong with the red-haired woman sitting across from him.

The shopping itself turned to be a torture for the blond jinchuuriki: Maria wanted a whole wardrobe of clothes for herself (even if as a Pandora, she could just materialize whatever she wanted), and he was forced to watch her trying the things on... On the plus side, at least for the perverted side that Jiraya somehow managed to install into him, he got to see quite a lot of her – 'The Goddess' wasn't very shy and, while she wasn't trying on undergarment or anything like that, some of the dresses were quite revealing.

Once the redhead got all of the clothes she wanted at the moment (of course, Naruto was the one to carry the bags), she let him go look for something he wanted or needed, while she browsed through the assortment of shops selling bijouterie and other various accessories. The blond shinobi immediately disappeared into one of the shops that sold fishing equipments: it was the most likely place for him to find thin metal wire – he lost any hopes to find titanium wire, but even a steel one would be alright as well for his needs... And to his luck, he actually found what he was looking for.

* * *

Still, maybe leaving Maria alone in the street was not the best idea: a classy and by no means poor woman on crutches seemed like an easy and 'profitable' target... So a group of street rats decided that they wanted to get some of her money.

"Hey, ma'am!" The leader of the small gang called out. Maria turned her head to look at them, before her grip on the crutches tightened: while she was an aristocratic girl by birth, following the first clash she had spent enough time on the streets to know what these guys wanted from her, and how they would try to attack her, if she refused (and she will!) to part with her money willingly. Plus, while she was still far from her peak of strength, unless these bastards had some firearms, they were of no real threat to her... "Why don't you give us your money?" The guy continued, while showing Maria his pocket knife. The redhead snorted: like she would be scared by this little blade; especially after she faced four S-class Novas simultaneously.

The gang, though, didn't like her reaction, and their apparent leader signaled for two of his goons, they too had pocket knives ready for some action, to attack. And those two did just that. Unfortunately for them, Maria was an experienced fighter, and her primary weapon was a lance... The rubber knob at the 'end' of the crutch did little to lessen the damage as 'The Goddess' thrust her substitute weapon into closest guy's gut. Before the bastard could react, Maria hit him on his head with the very same crutch, knocking him out cold. Without any pause, the redhead continued her 'attack' and hit the second goon between his legs. Once she was sure that these two wouldn't get up and attack her any time soon, she looked back at the gang leader, who seemed to be still trying to process what had just happened.

And his tiny mind came to a conclusion that he needed a bigger 'toy' there. But before he could even pull a pistol out of the inner pocket of his jacket, something hit him on the back of his head, sending him onto the ground to join two of his 'resting' goons... Looking at her 'savior' Maria saw Naruto, who held a reel of wire in one hand (and the bags with her clothes in another), while the final member of the gang lay on the asphalt behind him.

"And here I thought that they had learned their lesson from our previous meeting... Looks like they were too stupid to understand that they shouldn't attack those stronger than them." The revived Pandora felt her pride grow a little bit: she was acknowledged as strong, despite her current condition, after all.

"You know them?" Maria asked. Naruto replied with a shrug.

"Not really. They tried to rob me when I first got there. Failed of course, and not because I had no money on my person." The blond shinobi said with a chuckle.

"And of all things that are sold here, you bought yourself a fishing tackle?" The redhead asked, looking at the reel of wire he had in his hand. The Kyuubi jinchuuriki shook his head, even if she was kind of right.

"Nope, I'm not using it for fishing – I needed a thin metal wire to repair my clothes." At her questioning look, the blond sage elaborated: "My sweater has a titanium fishnet between the two layers of cloths, supposed to offer a minor protection... Though it was useless against the claws that Chiffon has as her volt weapon."

* * *

The rest of the shopping in the town was peaceful, though at some point Naruto had to summon a shadow clone to help him carry the bags – there were just too many of those for just one of him. And the Kyuubi jinchuuriki also noticed that Maria opened up to him a bit, though she still was behind a mile-high stone wall that she'd built around herself...

At the moment the two of them (three, if you count the clone) were riding the train back to the academy grounds. Much like expected their car had no other passengers – it was an early evening, and people rarely needed to go to the academy at this time. On weekdays at least. And Naruto decided to use this 'private' time of theirs to try and get 'the Goddess' to open up to him a bit more: he knew in person how hard it can be to adapt to a new world, and even with his outgoing personality, it took him some time to adjust. Maria was experiencing pretty much the same, and she wasn't as open as he was, so it should be even harder for her... She needed someone there she could lean on.

"You know, we are quite alike, Maria-san." He said offhandedly, getting redhead's attention.

"How so?" Of course, while she knew that he was different from everyone else she might meet out there, it was not likely that she was told the truth about him.

"First of all, we both are brought here. To this world in my case, and to this time in yours... Yes, I'm not even of this world – have you ever heard about anyone that can do a tenth of what I know you've seen me doing? Pandora and Limiters have a very limited set of skills, and those are just different from mine." Maria couldn't help but agree there: Naruto really seemed to be like a person from an alternative universe. "And now, onto the main similarity between us: I know what you are, Maria-san, I was the one to revive you, after all." He could see how her face changed, even if she tried to keep it neutral. "Don't worry, your secret is safe with me. I'm pretty much the same, after all... No, I don't have Nova parts in me, nor have I ever faced a Nova in my home world, but I do indeed have a powerful being in me. A demon, to be precise. I have a great demon sealed in my body; I am a human turned prison... Though, unlike you, only select few saw me as a savior and not an incarnation of that demon." 'The Goddess' cocked her head to the side, as she was absorbing what the blonde said. Yes, she could see his reasoning for relating himself with her. And to be honest, while she had been relying on mostly herself since she was not even a teen, she needed some support, even if her pride was telling her that she didn't.

"I see." Was her response. It sounded so cold, that Naruto thought, he made a mistake in confiding into her. And since she didn't say anything after that, that feeling the blonde had only grew stronger. But Maria managed to surprise him, and show that his worries were base-less when the train arrived to the academy: "You know, you should give lady a hand,.. Naruto-san." Yep, she related herself to him, and even called him by his name. Maybe she would really open up to him sooner or later. And just maybe, the fates still had something in store for them.

* * *

That's all folks  
leave me a **Review**!


	5. Into the cold lands

Here's the newest chapter for the "_**Antifreeze fox**_" story. Enjoy!

*** Review response**:  
**sh8ad8ow**, **Orchamus**, **Psudocode Samurai**, **Fangking2,** **bakapervert**, **Beginning and the End**, **ebm6969**, **Elemental Dragon Swordman**, **Dark Insomniacs**, **puma1sunfire**, **Still Not Dead Yet**, **BattleCharger**, **recoren**, **edboy4926**, **.owered**, **Citan**, **WolfLeader4000**, thank you for your reviews, folks!  
**Shadow of Sin 0**, **Alternate Rouge**, I will not abandon any of my stories, even if the updates are becoming rare. *promise*  
**fanficreader71**, here you go =)  
**ForeverYoung97**, list of synonyms for her is now more or less compiled.  
**Phantom Dark-Knight**, sorry, but I thought I had clearly stated that there are only two options for Naruto's pairing. You may try asking **Kyuubi16** for a more Harem-filled version of the story, but don't actually expect him starting yet another story right away.  
**kalakauai**, I try to read the updates as they are coming out (in English as Japanese is like gibberish to me)  
**G3neSyS**, Satella already got her guy, and won't change this. Also, she isn't the character I wish to change so that she can be outside canon pairing (+ I like Amelia and Maria more. Like I stated in my profile, I'd marry Amelia if I could).

*** Jutsu list**: **Shinobi techniques**:  
**Kawarimi **- (E-rank) substitution - _three guesses what it does_  
**Kage bunshin** - (A-rank) shadow clone technique - creates solid copies of a user.  
**Fuuton: rasen shuriken** - (S-rank) wind style: spiral shuriken - rasengan infused with wind chakra. highly destructive, but when used point blank instead of being thrown, does damage to the wielder as well.  
**Rasengan** - (A-rank) spiral sphere - a ball of compressed chakra that deals a lot of drilling damage.  
**Chou oodama rasengan** - (sage arts) colossal spiral sphere - big rasengan made of sage chakra.  
*** Jutsu list**: **Pandora-Limiter techniques**:  
**Freezing** - Limiter locally negates the Freezing field of Nova and (stronger ones) deploy their own freezing field.  
**Accel turn** - increases speed of a Pandora. 5x acceleration allows one to move with a speed close to sound barrier. Not all Pandora can use this technique.  
**Tempest turn** - 'cloning' through sheer speed. So far the shown limit is 10 copies. Not all Pandora can use this technique.

*** Poll**: While still open, the poll has already served its purpose - over 70% voted for the threesome. Those, who wanted to see this as strictly Naruto/Maria... Sorry.

*** AN**: I won't do the next chapter until I see the readable end of the current arc, as I will need it to form the final plot for the chapter.

**ALSO**: Pairing is now officially changed to Maria/Naruto/Amelia!

* * *

**Disclaimer**: I DO NOT own "_**Naruto**_" or "_**Freezing**_". No profit is being made. Oh, and I borrowed some names from other anime & manga. I don't own those either.

"speaking"  
'_thinking_'  
"**speaking of the higher beings** / **jutsu** / **speaking in power ****mode**"  
'_**thinking of the higher beings**_'

* * *

**chapter V: Into the cold lands**

It was roughly a week since that little venture of theirs into the town, and during this time Maria warmed up quite a bit towards the Kyuubi jinchuuriki. Sure, it didn't look like that with her usual aloof and unapproachable self, but in truth the blond shinobi was the one she trusted the most. Sometimes, she even shared some of her worries or the stories of her past with him, when it was just the two of them... And while they were getting closer to each other, 'the Goddess' still didn't feel that it would be right if she asked him to be her partner now.

Also, during this week 'the Goddess' had recovered enough to no longer need the crutches, which she was happy to throw away since she saw them as a weakness she needn't. But even if she now could move freely, Elize-sensei was telling her that she still wasn't ready to use her Pandora powers again. This irritated the redhead very much, but she knew it better than abusing her body by making it do things it was not ready for – from her past experiences she knew that the result won't be pretty...

Still, while she had not yet completely recovered, it was still decided that Maria should attend classes with the second year students. The reasoning behind this decision was the following: while at her prime 'the Goddess' could wipe the floor with every singe Pandora at the academy, and she was by far the most experienced, when it came to dealing with Nova, she still lacked high-end skills current generations of Pandora were taught and her knowledge about the clashes that followed the second one was limited... Of course, for now she could only learn the theory behind the high-end skills, but no one doubted that once she could use her Pandora powers, she'll be able to master the practical side of them in no time.

* * *

Of course, the reaction of the second year Pandora, when they were told that they will be getting a new classmate for the next several weeks was interesting. Especially when that student turned out to be a red-haired woman over twenty year old that they all likely had seen many times around the academy campus... To make the things 'worse' for Maria, it so happened that her first day with these girls was dedicated to sparring practices. The fact that she wasn't wearing the standard uniform, opting for light-gray top and camouflage shorts didn't help 'the Goddess' get onto their good side... Not that she cared, especially since she was quite sure that once they were told her true identity, these Pandora in training would practically worship the ground she was walking on.

While most of the young Pandora were mostly silently studying their new and temporary classmate, some weren't. Ganessa Roland, for some reason still number one of the year, even if everyone knew that Satellizer was stronger than her, was for whatever reason not very happy with Maria joining their year and didn't hide that. The older redhead, though, didn't pay her much mind, which only seemed to provoke Ganessa further. And before the things had escalated too far, Yumi-sensei decided to intervene. By announcing the first sparring match of today's practice to be between them.

"No weapon?" Ganessa asked when she didn't see Maria call forth her own volt weapon. "Ha! And you really think that you have a chance?" 'The Goddess' didn't let it provoke her into doing something stupid: she knew it better than losing her cool in the fight – yet another thing she had learned from experience during the battles of the second clash.

"I'm forbidden from using my volt weapon at the moment." She replied to her opponent. "But don't worry, I can fight you without one as well." Feeling that if she didn't start the fight right now it would start anyway, the instructor did just that... Not wasting any time, Ganessa sent her chains at 'the Goddess', wishing to win the spar quickly and in a way to embarrass the haughty older Pandora. Much to her surprise, though, Maria dodged two of her chains and caught the others with her hands. "Gotcha!" And then 'the Goddess' yanked the chains with her super-human strength, causing her opponent to fly towards her. Ganessa tried to avoid getting hit by Maria's leg with her **Accel turn**, but as she was already off the ground, the younger redhead could do nothing and received quite a painful kick to her left side, which stunned her for a moment. And this single moment was enough for the proto-Pandora to elbow her to the back of her head, thus knocking her opponent out.

"...Winner of the first match is Maria." Yumi-sensei said on automate as she was shocked by how fast 'the Goddess' had defeated one of the strongest Pandora among the second years. While she knew exactly who Maria was, it was still quite overwhelming to see the difference in fighting capabilities between a trainee and a Nova-clash veteran.

"Pf." The revived proto-Pandora hm'ed, before picking Ganessa by her shirt and carrying her to the sidelines where girl's associates were. And once she dropped the girl there, Maria headed to sit by Satellizer – she trusted the blonde the most among the students, and it also helped that the younger Pandora knew her (true) identity...

* * *

From what Maria had observed during the spars of her new 'classmates', only Satellizer and Rana would be worth something on the battlefield at the moment. Others were either too slow or too weak, or were just not ready – Ganessa, with how haughty she was, was a good example for the third group. Of course, 'the Goddess' herself was haughty and prideful too, something that stemmed from her battle prowess and her past status of the only Pandora in the world, but at least she knew to never underestimate her opponent...

But, anyway, these spars had showed her what the modern-type Pandora could do. And, to be honest, Maria was finding the **Accel turn** and the **Tempest turn** techniques to be very useful. And now she was definitely going to trying to master at least one of those two as soon as he was cleared for using her volt texture. Though, there was a possibility that it won't work for her because of how different she was from the modern-type Pandora. But the redhead hoped that that wasn't the case.

Unlike the practical, where she got to see what her comrades were supposed to be able to do in the fight, the theory lessons she had during her first week among the academy students were pretty much useless: the professor was talking about the third and fourth clashes, which didn't give Maria any new information about what she was to expect from the Nova. Actually, the quick briefing Chiffon had given her before her release from the hospital had been far more informative...

* * *

Ten days after she was entered into the academy – something that seemed to be rather pointless to her as she had barely learned anything both new and valuable there – Maria was finally cleared for using her volt texture again. And she did use it as soon as her mandatory bi-daily visit to the medical wing was finished: while she rather liked the clothes she had, she still favored the ones created by her own volt texture more. As for some sparring while using her trusted weapon again... This had to wait till the next day at very least, but 'the Goddess' actually didn't mind such a wait that much. She could be patient when it was needed...

Not that she needed to wait for long to show off, as the next day was once again the sparring practice. And, the next morning, when the young Pandora were walking down to the stadium from the locker rooms, Maria approached Satellizer, whom she wanted as her opponent during the spars today.

"I want to fight you today." 'The Goddess' said rather bluntly, after exchanging polite greetings the blonde Pandora. The said Pandora raised her eyebrow.

"I know that you're strong, Maria, but do you really want this? Unlike those whom you fought so far, my weapon is a sword." The redhead shook her head.

"Yesterday Elize-san cleared me for using my volt texture, so I can finally summon my own weapons. So your sword should not be that kind of a problem for me anymore." Satellizer nodded, before telling the revived proto-Pandora that she will spar with her: like everyone who knew of Maria's true identity, the 'untouchable queen' too wanted to see what the living legend could do.

And it wasn't that hard for the two of them to convince Yumi-sensei that their spar should be among the first ones as the Korean Pandora too wanted to see what Maria was truly capable of... So, as soon as the sparring practice began, the match between Satellizer and Maria was announced.

"So, here were go." The blond Pandora-in-training said, while materializing her sword. Her red-haired opponent, studied the weapon for a moment, before calling forth her own: a huge knight's lance that was easily four meters long, maybe even a bit more. Of course, it was rather clear that this lace wasn't well-suited for fighting against another Pandora, but no was going to deny that it was formidable weapon against targets as big as Nova. "Fitting." Satellizer commented, referring to Maria's family name. 'The Goddess' just nodded in response. Then she manifested the second weapon, which was a gauntlet with three inches long claws attached to each finger. It surprised many as it was not normal for someone to have a set of so different weapons – usually the weapons of the set were either identical or at least very similar.

"Shall we?" The redhead asked, while aiming her lance at her opponent. Satellizer just nodded, before vanishing from the view, going straight for the **double Accel**: this seemed to be only way for her to be Maria's equal. She reappeared to 'the Goddess's' right, hoping that the lance would not be fast enough to intercept her attack... The red-haired proto-Pandora, though, didn't attempt to block and, using her lance's huge size to an advantage, counterattacked with wide-arc move, forcing the blonde girl on defensive. But before 'the Goddess' could press her advantage, Satellizer used **triple Accel** to disappear from her opponent's view.

She didn't stay hidden for long, though, and just a couple of seconds later attacked Maria again, this time coming from the redhead's left side... While the 'untouchable queen' was without question much faster than her opponent, Maria's battle experience was unmatched by anyone in the academy, including instructors, so the revived proto-Pandora wasn't caught by surprise and managed to dodge the downwards swing of Satellizer's sword. The redhead then tried to hit the younger Pandora with her lance, but it connected only with an afterimage.

Maria sighed, being rather annoyed with her inability to land a hit on her opponent, but forced herself to remain calm and waited for the next incoming attack, as a plan – a risky one, but, still – had already formed in her head: if she could prevent her opponent from moving, the difference in their speeds would be meaningless... 'The Goddess' didn't have to wait for long, as soon Satellizer made herself known once again as she tried to attack her from behind. Barely dodging the attack that would have otherwise left a deep wound on her right shoulder, Maria thrust the blunt end of her lance into her opponent's gut – and actually managed to land a hit now – and then quickly turned around, catching Satellizer's sword hand with her gauntlet before the blond Pandora could recover and vanish away with her superior speed.

Now it came down to the brute strength, and Maria was far superior here, even without resorting to volt texture to augment her muscles further. So, really, once she was caught, Satellizer stood no chance, and the blonde understood this.

"I forfeit." She said, thus ending the match. And surprising many as she was considered to be too stubborn and headstrong to give up just like this. Even if her opponent seemed to be superior to her. And, to the other Pandora-in-training at least, Maria wasn't in that category, even if the older redhead had proven herself to be an incredibly powerful fighter...

"Winner of the fight is Maria." Yumi-sensei announced, thus officially ending the match. As soon as she was done with the announcement, both Pandora had released their volt weapons.

"This was not a bad fight." The revived redhead said. "But from what I've heard, you can use even greater levels of **Accel turn**. You could have won, had you used them against me." Satellizer shook her head.

"**Quadruple Accel** for me is something that initiates stigmata corrosion. I don't feel that it's worth using something this risky in a sparring with a comrade..." The blonde made a rather long pause there, before continuing talking: "But I can ask you similar question: it's a documented fact that you could use what now is called Pandora mode, yet you didn't now. Why?" Maria shrugged.

"I was cleared to access my volt texture only yesterday. I don't think I'm ready to use it at the moment – and even if I was, it'd still be an overkill for one on one fight with a friendly warrior." She replied... Indeed, Maria's Pandora mode was special: not only it far surpassed the one that the modern-type Pandora had in terms of speed and strength bonus, but 'the Goddess' also could use it almost indefinitely... within a single battle of course – her limit was well above one hour, and even then the worst she got from using it for that long was great tiredness.

"Well, anyway, I think we should clear the arena for the next match." The blond Pandora-in-training said, reminding Maria that the two of them were still standing in the center of the arena they fought on.

**~/ *** \~**

Naruto stopped reading the scroll on senjutsu that the toad sages allowed him to take from the mt. Myouboku – one of many things he had sealed on his body when he was transported to this world – when he heard someone knocking on his room's door. He was rather surprised to see that his guest was Maria: while the redhead had confided in him form time to time, so far she had never actually came to his room, always catching him before he got there.

"Can I come in, Naruto?" 'The Goddess' asked. The Kyuubi jinchuuriki nodded and let her in.

"Something has happened?" He asked – indeed, the redhead was not her usual calm and collected self, even if she was hiding it well.

"They are summoning me to the Chevalier headquarters." The red-haired beauty replied.

"Well, you're a living legend there. Of course they'd want you as soon as they were sure that you've recovered." He reasoned – indeed, it has been three days since Elize-sensei had cleared Maria to access her Pandora powers... The redhead nodded, accepting his argument, but still hadn't calmed down completely.

"Um... I'm supposed to bring my partner along, and..." She finally said, after several seconds of an uneasy silence.

"And so you're choosing me." It wasn't even a question. Naruto now was quite sure that she was there to ask him to follow her to some different land. 'The Goddess' blushed slightly, though the blond shinobi wasn't sure why, but still she nodded. Naruto thought about it for a bit. And he came to the conclusion that he would not lose anything if he will come with Maria – who somehow ended as the one closest to his heart, not that he really saw her as anything more than a friend (a very hot one at that), but... "Very well, I'll come with you, Maria-chan." Now the redhead's cheeks unmistakeably turned pink.

"Thank you." She said.

"When are you leaving then?" The blond sage asked then. After all, if he was leaving West Genetics soon, he needed to seal his stuff away into the scrolls, and even that would take some time.

"The plane will leave here at noon tomorrow." Naruto shook his head: even in this world those in power still notified their subordinates about their decisions at the latest possible date... Meanwhile Maria continued. "I've put a word for you with sister Margaret, so you'll be officially transferred, should you agree to come with me, so you don't have to deal with any paperwork." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki nodded a 'thank you' to her. "And... Naruto-kun..." The redhead started nervously, while blushing a deeper shade of red. Then there was a pause, which lasted several long seconds. "We will be expected to act as a couple... Or at very least we shouldn't be shy around each other..." She finally said in a whisper, while stepping closer to him, till their noses were just inches away, and placing her right hand onto his chest. Then she took his right hand with her left one and placed it over her heart (and her breast), making the Kyuubi jinchuuriki's blush now rival her own.

They stood just like that for over a minute, both too afraid to make the next step... Eventually, Maria broke their contact and did a couple of steps back. Once again, the two of them didn't knew what to say or do next. And after some long seconds of just looking at each other, 'the Goddess' found it in herself to solve their current problem, even if not in the best way.

"Thank you for agreeing to be my partner... And see you tomorrow, Naruto-kun." She said, before, turning around and heading back to her own apartment, leaving a slightly dumbfounded Kyuubi jinchuuriki standing in the middle of his room...

**~/ *** \~**

The next morning Naruto was quite nervous, especially because he didn't see Maria at the mess during the breakfast time. But when finally got to the airfield – just a little past half past eleven – he found the red-haired beauty there, sitting atop of one of the two huge bags she had with her... Exchanging greetings with her, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki looked around and not finding any signs of their plane being there already or even arriving soon, he leaned against against the wall next to his new 'partner', content to spend the time waiting in a comfortable silence... This silence, though, lasted only until 'the Goddess' noticed the apparent lack of any luggage the belonged to the blond sage.

"Um? Aren't taking your things with you, Naruto-kun?" Maria asked, turning her head to look at him.

"Why? I have everything I need on my person." He replied, showing her a scroll into which he had sealed all of his belongings. "You're forgetting that my sealing arts are good for many things." The redhead nodded.

"I see... It's just I still can't get used to everything that you can do..." Whatever else she wanted to say remained unspoken as the two of them heard the sound of an approaching jet. "Finally." A couple of minutes later the two of them saw a big silvery VTOL jet with Chevalier emblems on its sides landing a hundred metes away from them on one of the free landing pads the airfield had at the moment.

This particular VTOL, unlike the choppers used to deploy Pandora-Limiter pairs from the academy to the battlefields, was more of a high-end aircraft that was used to carry important people around. Well, to think of it, Maria was quite a VIP, so it was understandable why something like this was sent to pick her (and her partner) up...

As soon as the plane was safely on the ground, previous hidden somewhere airfield workers appeared and busied themselves with servicing the machine. And at about the same time, a side door on the plane opened and a member of its crew jumped out of it onto the ground, heading to where the luggage compartment was... Seeing this, Maria nodded to Naruto.

"Let's go." She said as she stood up. Then she easily lifted her bags, though the blond jinchuuriki was quite sure that either weighted as much as the redhead herself. Perks of being a Pandora, most likely, he thought... Nodding, he followed the redhead to the plane, but as he had no sizable baggage, he had to wait for her at the ladder, while the co-pilot was fitting her bags inside the luggage compartment...

* * *

As soon as the plane was refueled, it took off, heading towards the Chevalier base in Alaska. It was going to be a seven hours long flight, and Naruto was really thankful that the cabin had extremely comfortable leather armchairs for them (him and Maria) to sit in – he'd get a backache if he had to spend this much time sitting on the rough metal benches that were installed inside the troop-carrier choppers...

And he was also thankful that he had sealed everything he owned into a scroll that was currently sitting in his cloak's inner pocket: if he get bored with watching the clouds out of the windows – as someone who had never fly anywhere as a simple passenger, he was quite interested in seeing the scenery outside – he could always unseal some interesting scroll to read... Maria wasn't as lucky and had to entertain herself with some second-rate magazine that was there or she could just try to sleep for the duration of the flight. And, apparently, the red-haired Pandora decided that watching a dream or two was a better option as she appeared to be sleeping in her seat... Shaking his head, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki returned to watching the clouds flying by somewhere underneath the plane...

**~/ *** \~**

The plane arrived to the Alaskan base an hour after midnight by the local time, so it was quite understandable that only a small group of technical personal and a single representative of Chevalier organization were there at the airfield to greet both 'the Goddess' and her (newly chosen) partner. Of course, since this still was a military base, there were some formalities that needed to be met, before Naruto and Maria were allowed inside, but those were mostly formalities and didn't take much time.

The duo was then guided to the living quarters within the base, where they were assigned a room, just one for the two of them. At least their room was a lux, normally reserved for really important guests, and not at all like those barrack-like rooms, that would be given to the standard Pandora-Limiter pairs... Still, lux or not, their room had only one (even if king-sized) bed, which they will have to share, whether they wanted to or not... Well, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki thought, Maria didn't seem to have anything against such arrangement, and he himself, to be honest, didn't mind either.

* * *

In the morning – though neither of them had slept during the night, unpacking their things and making their room a little more lived in – they were given a quick tour around the base. This tour ended in the local mess and just in time for some breakfast.

And while they were having their meal, another Chevalier representative approached them and told Maria that she was expected to appear in front of the organization commanders in half an hour, and she was to appear in front of them alone, which meant the Naruto was left to wander by himself. Oh well, he could just go back to their room and continue reading that senjutsu scroll.

At the end of the meal the Kyuubi jinchuuriki quietly told his red-haired partner that he'd be alright by himself and that she shouldn't worry about him. The revived Pandora nodded and let herself be guided to the conference rooms, while Naruto headed back to the living quarters.

But, apparently, Fate had different plans for him for today as soon he almost run into a young woman in her early twenties who, while dressed like a civilian, was unmistakeably a Pandora, and a very strong one at that – he couldn't really estimate her true power as she was consciously suppressing it. This particular Pandora had slightly angular face, pale skin, dark-blue eyes and mid-back long dark-brown, almost black, hair...

The two of them looked at each other for several seconds, till they both actually recognized each other. Naruto had being told about her during one of his theoretical lessons when the current structure of the Chevalier organization was discussed: this was Su-na Lee, otherwise, the strongest active-duty Pandora at the moment... And she recognized the blond sage as a 'human' capable of killing a Nova on his own was, obviously, of a great interest to the Chevaliers and everyone high enough had heard at least something about him.

"Uzumaki-san, I presume?" She said rather quietly. And this, actually, made Naruto think that she had quite a lot in common with Hinata as they seemed to share similar dispositions.

"Yes." He replied. "And you would be Ms. Su-na Lee." The woman in front of him nodded. "Then, I'm rather surprised to see you there, I honestly thought that the strongest Pandora in the Chevalier organization would be at the meeting with Maria, instead of here." Su-na shook her head.

"Despite my status as a Pandora, I have little political power within the Chevaliers. I have no real reason to be at that meeting at the moment – my Limiter is already there – and I'm sure I can get a chance to speak to Maria-sama later." She explained. "You, Uzumaki-san, on the other hand, might not be as easy to talk to at the later date, and you're just as interesting to me as Maria-sama is."

"I see..." Was all that the Kyuubi jinchuuriki could reply.

"Anyway,.." The strongest Pandora among the Chevaliers continued. "What I wished for is to see your abilities, Uzumaki-san. I've heard some interesting rumors about what you can do, and I wish to see if these rumors are true." Well, maybe she wasn't all like Hinata was: the shy Hyuuga would never ask something like this from him... But back to this world, Naruto decided that some practice with his techniques would be just as good for him as spending his time in his room, wasting away over the ages old scrolls.

"Very well." He replied. "Lead the way."

* * *

Since Su-na was an active-duty Chevalier organization member, and quite high-up there, no matter what she told Naruto, she was allowed to come to the base and go out of it as she pleased. And right now she used this right of hers to get herself and the blonde sage out into the tundra – she had heard rumors about how destructive his attacks were and thus decided against having him demonstrate those indoors.

"We're here." She stated simply. "Now, will you show me what you can do?" She said, while slipping into her defensive stance, though she did not summon her volt weapon... The Kyuubi jinchuuriki shook his head.

"I will not fight you." This statement made the Pandora raise her eyebrow. "You're far too strong for me to even stand a chance against you without resorting to the techniques that **will** be fatal, should they connect with you." Su-na Lee sighed and returned to standing normally – it looked like today wasn't exactly her day. "But if you wish, I might throw around some jutsu for you. I doubt that higher-ups will be angry if I blow up some ice over there." He said pointing to the frozen lake some two hundred meters away form them.

"Then, please, do so." The dark-haired Pandora said, silently happy that she still will get to see something as unusual as his Nova-killer moves.

"OK." The blonde, before becoming still to enter his sage mode. And as soon as he had the natural energy flowing through him, he created a normal **rasengan** on the palm of his hand. This caused Su-na Lee to raise her eyebrow: she was told that his techniques were bigger than this grapefruit-sized blue ball of energy, while voicing this to him. "Well, this is a base for the good half of my more powerful techniques, so I decided that I should show it first." He replied, before expanding the **rasengan** into **Chou oodama** one.

"Now it's more like the technique I heard about." The dark-haired Pandora said, before adding: "It looks quite powerful too."

"It is." Naruto confirmed. "But this technique has one distinctive drawback: it is a melee one – even if it can do significant amount of damage to the S-type Nova, I still need to get really close for that." Su-na Lee nodded in understanding. Even for someone strong like her getting this close to a Nova was not recommended. "There's a ranged variation of this technique. It doesn't work really that well in the **freezing field**, but still..." With these words the blond dispelled the **rasengan** he was holding at the moment, and summoned a shadow clone, startling the dark-haired Pandora a bit with this.

"Is it something like the copies **Tempest turn** produces?" She asked, studying the doppelganger, which made a hurt face at being called 'it'... Naruto shook his head.

"No, this is a physical clone that has a copy of my psycho-matrix and is a more or less independent being. It will cease to exist the moment it runs out of energy, or when it takes a hit." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki tried to explain, what the **kage bunshin** was, without giving too much information away. "Now then..." With the help of his doppelganger, the blond sage created his (infamous) **rasen shuriken**, which seemed to already impress the dark-haired Pandora. "Behold the mightiest technique of mine." This was a lie, but she didn't need to know that... As soon as he finished speaking, Naruto threw the jutsu towards the frozen lake, before quickly doing a couple of handseals and exhaling a small ball of compressed air. It caught up with the wind-powered **rasengan** right over the surface of the lake, causing the other technique to explode in a huge dome of deadly winds that tore everything into fine dust.

"Whoa!" Was all that Su-na Lee could say after seeing the sheer destructive power of this technique. "This should be able to kill a Nova." Naruto shook his head.

"Actually, no. **Freezing field** weakens it greatly, and I can't really throw it while under the effects of the field, but the jutsu is still capable of tearing Nova's armor apart. Two successive hits, though, will kill one of those monsters." He said.

"I see..." The dark-haired Pandora replied. "Thank you for the demonstration." Then there was a short pause, before she continued: "Since we're not going to spar, I believe we should head back to the base now." Nodding, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki followed the young woman as she went back to the base's gates...

* * *

Despite the actually quite lengthy time he had spent showing his techniques off in front of Su-na Lee, Naruto still arrived first to the room he and Maria were given for the duration of their stay at the base... Actually, the redhead didn't show up before it was lunch time, so the blond sage had to walk to the mess alone. Not that he minded it, but in the recent days he actually got used to having some company, usually, Maria, while going somewhere...

He was almost done with his meal, when the revived proto-Pandora had finally showed up, taking a seat across from him. And she looked rather worn out from her meeting with the higher-ups, though, Naruto could tell, she also was in a good mood at the moment – be that from being finally free from bureaucrats or from those colonel shoulder straps she now had, he wasn't sure.

"Are congratulations in order?" He asked his partner. Maria looked up at him, before sighing and shaking her head.

"Well, yeah, but I think I should finish with my briefings first... If I knew that being of a high rank will be such a pain in the ass, I'd remain a lieutenant I was before my 'death'." She said a bit tiredly. This actually made the Kyuubi jinchuuriki chuckle.

"There surely should be some perks to your new position, right?" He asked. The red-haired beauty across from him nodded.

"Yeah, and we're definitely making use of one of them tonight. I was told that there is a good swimming pool here." She said, before adding: "And you're coming with me, _Naru-chan_..." Wow, who would have thought that Maria actually could tease? "I can't be seen there without my partner, now can I?" Naruto could only nod dumbly at this ...invitation.

* * *

Maria's briefings ended at about five in the evening by the local time, and as soon as that finally happened, the redhead dropped by their room to get him (as well as her things like her swimsuit) for their little outing...

The pool there was good – incredibly so for something way beyond the Arctic circle – and, as there weren't many people at the base at the moment, it was actually empty, when the two of them arrived there. Here they had to temporarily part their ways as the locker rooms there were separate for males and females, and the duo did need to change their clothes.

A couple of minutes later they met up again, and Naruto had to do a double take at Maria wearing a reddish-purple bikini: he knew that the redhead was a beauty, but he honestly didn't expect her to look this good and this hot... The said beauty noticed his blush, the cause of which she was, and, seeing that they were alone at the pool, did some teasingly-sexy poses for him, making the Kyuubi jinchuuriki gain a noticeable trickle of blood from his nose... Of course, she stopped teasing him before he bled to death, but Naruto still got one hell of a show...

Of course, the blond sage gave as good as he got a bit later – revenge is the dish best served cold, after all... He waited till Maria was lazily floating on her back with, her eyes closed as she enjoyed the warm water of the pool; this was when he approached her, using his water-walking skill. The sudden appearance of a shadow over her caused the revived proto-Pandora to open her eyes.

"I-Is this another shinobi skill of yours?" She asked upon seeing her partner standing atop the water surface, like it was as hard as a stone. The blonde just nodded. "Is this something you can teach me?" Of course, water-walking was cool enough for her to want to learn it.

"I don't think so: it's like shinobi-only skill." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki replied, while shaking his head. "But I still can give you some of it." He stated then, while offering her his hand. Maria accepted it, of course, allowing him to pull her up onto her feet – what she couldn't see was him extending his chakra outwards to create a 'surface' for her to stand on... Once she was sure that she really could stand on the water, the redhead made a small step to the side with a grace of a ballerina that one hardly could expect from a Nova-killer.

"Wow." Was all that she said, but this surmised her thoughts about the water-walking very well... And she was kind of caught in her thoughts and didn't notice an devilish grin appearing on her partner's face. Suddenly he let her hand go, while retracting his chakra from underneath her feet, causing her to suddenly sink into the water. "Why you?" The red-haired beauty hissed in a mock offense once she had resurfaced. "Take this!" Then, with an evil grin matching the one he had moments ago, she pulled Naruto under the water by his ankles... Now it was blonde's turn to glare at her with that mock-offense in his eyes, but, well... Deciding that escalating the things into a small 'war' wasn't worth time of strength, he didn't respond to this and let the redhead continue enjoying herself without interruptions from his side, while too having some fun of his own in the other end of the pool...

* * *

Since they both hadn't slept the previous night here, Naruto and Maria called it a day right after an early dinner they had once they were done with their little outing to the pool. And this was when the single king-sized bed that was there in their room became a problem – they had to share it, whether they wanted that or not, and while they were rather close, they weren't this close. Yet... On the second thought, they were tired enough to not really care about this at the moment. Still, unconsciously, they left some space between them.

**~/ *** \~**

Come next morning, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki found himself enjoying the pleasant sensation of something soft and warm pressed tightly against his back, as well as a gentle hand resting across his stomach... It took all of his self-control not to jump out of the bed when he finally realized that sometime during the night Maria had rolled over onto 'his' side of their bed and now the said redhead was spooning him with her rather sizable, and covered only by a thin nightie, breasts pressing deliciously into his back.

Seeing that the red-haired Pandora was still soundly asleep, Naruto did his best to untangle himself from her, while gentle, quite firm grasp without waking her up. And a couple of failed attempts to that on his own later, the blonde sage was forced to resort to 'cheating'. Namely – summoning a shadow clone and substituting himself with it. The clone didn't seem to mind being used like this very much. It didn't even dispel once its primary purpose was fulfilled... Labeling his clone – and himself by extension – a pervert in his head, Naruto himself began sorting through the things he needed to do today before the breakfast...

* * *

Eventually, the embarrassing situation – the clone didn't dispel on its own even when Maria finally decided that it was time for her to wake up – was diffused, and the duo was on their way to the mess, when some low-level bureaucrat of the Chevalier organization approached the revived proto-Pandora with some official papers, apparently for her eyes only.

"_This_ could have waited until after we had our breakfast." The redhead said with a sigh, while she scanned the papers with her eyes. Then she turned to her blond partner and gave him a brief summary of what was written there: "Apparently, they want us be there at the airfield to meet some arriving active-duty Pandora this afternoon. And then, a bit later, the first two groups of trainees. Some E-Pandora and the delegation from Indian academy." Naruto just shrugged – despite having spent more time in the current time of this world than Maria, he wasn't familiar with either of those.

* * *

Despite all of the pathos of the greetings for all three arriving groups, the afternoon was more than quite boring from being overly formal, when it was not really needed...

And while the big men were talking, Naruto took to studying the arrivals. All active-duty Chevalier Pandora, of course, were powerful and all of them were likely to beat him, element of surprise on his side or not, but still none of them was truly special. Likewise, the Indian delegation consisted of just plainly powerful girls (and their Limiters), but even among there was no one special like Chiffon or Satellizer.

The E-Pandora group, while seemingly the weakest one, at least was interesting. Unlike the other two groups, they did not have Limiters with them, and they also had a distinctive leader in their group. The said leader was also by far the strongest among the girls, and was somewhere near Arnett in terms of strength, if his sensor abilities were still as good as they used to be... Unfortunately, he didn't have much time to study that E-Pandora or her comrades, as the group was quickly guided somewhere into the depths of the base.

* * *

While the E-Pandora group (and, especially, their leader) had picked Naruto's interest, neither he met them for long enough to do some 'research' on them with his sensor skills, nor he or Maria were granted access to any significant information about these girls... The only certain thing the duo managed to get out of the higher-up was the fact they were an experimental 'batch' of Pandora made from seemingly normal girls who weren't cut for becoming Pandora through 'normal' means.

Not that the blond sage actually had much time to work on gathering the info about these E-Pandora, as, along with Maria, he had to be greeting all of the arriving delegations – and there were quite a few of those.

**~/ *** \~**

"So cold..." Rana said as she, along with the rest of the West Genetics academy delegation stepped out of the plane that brought them to this base. Next to her, Kazuya nodded in agreement, while wrapping himself tighter up into the jacket he was going on their way here.

"It's really cold here, even though its already the end of May." He said.

"It seems that the temperature here can even go into the negatives." Satellizer, who was pretty much the only one not bothered by the the cold weather, helpfully supplied, causing a rather predictable reaction from both her 'unofficial' Limiter and her rival for the said Limiter's heart.

"Ahem, boys and girls." A calm and collected voice that could only belong to Maria caused the entire delegation to turn to look at the proto-Pandora. While everyone but Elizabeth and her Limiter Andre were more or less familiar with the redhead, none of them had seen her in her military uniform yet. Well, Maria wasn't following the protocols completely as her jacket was unzipped, showing off her (once again, camouflage-patterned) T-shirt – apparently, the red-haired beauty wasn't at all bothered by the chilly weather... Next to her was Naruto, clad in his usual 'sage' attire. "Now, then, to those who are not familiar with me, I'm colonel Maria Elizabeth Lancelot..." Naruto chuckled at seeing Elizabeth's shocked expression: it looked like not everyone sent here had been informed about who Maria really was. "...And I'll be your direct superior during your stay at this base. I hope that we can work well together."

* * *

That's all folks  
leave me a **Review**!


	6. MiniCarnival

Finally, here's the new chapter of the "_**Antifreeze fox**_" story. Enjoy!  
I'm terribly sorry - I should have posted it a week ago - but my laptop decided to have some hardware problems, and... but I finally got my precious back, so here's your chapter. To those who are waiting for the update of the "_**Konoha's young sage**_" story, I'm sorry, but don't expect it until the beginning of the next week. I still need to finish restoring my system after that trouble with hardware.

*** Review response**:  
**FoxHero007**, **ebm6969**, **karthik9**, **sh8ad8ow**, **recoren**, **7 Winds**, **Cloves**, **Alternate Rouge**, **Beginning and the End**, **Silber D. Wolf**, **AstralJean**, **pokemaster12**, **G3neSyS**, **Still Not Dead Yet**, **fanficreader71**, **Antoinette Castellan**, **ForeverYoung97**, **Elemental Dragon Swordman**, **puma1sunfire**, **Toby860**, **OverPowered**, **Ysfrael**, **BladePhoenix41**, **Hashi-kun**, **kpsanimefan**, **XKhaosXKyuubiX**, **Lazyman12**, **Silv3r**, **DARKANGELWRATH**, **Ruvian**, **wayswitch**, **Arct1cfox**, **Jose19**, **Nanashi113**, **Dragonskyt**, **BattleCharger**, thank you for your reviews, folks!  
**kalakauai**, **edboy4926**, as a spoiler, I'll tell you that I have a bit different set of events planned for what follows Gina's death. And even the said death will be quite different from the 'canon' one.  
**Orchamus**, Pandora themselves (unless the stigmata corrosion is at the stage when they are all but Nova themselves) do not produce freezing field - that's Limiter's 'job'. Hence, without Limiters, Pandora have no real advantage over Naruto (weapon mastery / general toughness aside).  
**Shadow of Sin 0**, I hope that the next chapter will add some suspense (this one may too, depending on what kind of suspense you're looking for).  
**Hellfire44**, one: that part was written quite some time before Chiffon's Maria-form was revealed. Two: my Chiffon so far isn't fighting Naruto canon-seriously. And she still can beat him half of the time. Sometime later I'll show Maria's full power, and Chiffon's final in canon should be around the same level. Chevalier high-ranks might not have exactly extreme powers, but they do have great enough level of experience to compensate for that (note, that Nova's appear in my story much frequently and in greater numbers, than in canon - Alaska fiasco will be counted as a part of 10th clash there, but in canon it's 11th). Oh well... I'm not really going to make you see the world my way... *lazy*  
**fragglemaster**, I believe that her original rank should be lieutenant. I made her colonel here, mostly because she is the most experienced Pandora in existence, and she is kind of a 'goddess' of a modern world that protects humanity. That, and she can beat ANY Pandora in the world if she fights for real. Like I pointed it out just above this reply, I'll show her true power a bit later.  
**Nekomata N. Ninja**, they are more friendly there, but they aren't great pals either.  
**serialkeller**, in his first fight, Naruto can take on pretty much any Pandora (Maria and Chiffon may still beat him, should they go all out). But once they know how he fights, the stronger ones will beat him. Naruto's actual level in sage mode is just above Elizabeth's. If he goes Kyuubi on them... Not sure. He might win. Or he might lose. It will depend on circumstances greatly.

*** Jutsu list**: **Shinobi techniques**:  
**Shunshin no jutsu** - (D-rank) body flicker technique - short range 'teleportation'  
**unnamed air pressure technique** - C-rank - compresses air in the certain area, causing effects that can sometimes be mistaken for increased gravity. And while this technique is rather good for improving one's control over wind element, it requires too much time to initialize to be really effective in combat. It uses quite a lot of chakra too.  
**unnamed rock spikes technique** - unknown rank - creates a ring of stone spikes around the target as a way to trap it. May be a variation of **doton: ganchuusou** jutsu.  
*** Jutsu list**: **Pandora-Limiter techniques**:  
**Freezing** - Limiter locally negates the Freezing field of Nova and (stronger ones) deploy their own freezing field.  
**Accel turn** - increases speed of a Pandora. 5x acceleration allows one to move with a speed close to sound barrier. Not all Pandora can use this technique.  
**Tempest turn** - 'cloning' through sheer speed. So far the shown limit is 10 copies. Not all Pandora can use this technique.

* * *

**Disclaimer**: I DO NOT own "_**Naruto**_" or "_**Freezing**_". No profit is being made. Oh, and I borrowed some names from other anime & manga. I don't own those either.

"speaking"  
'_thinking_'  
"**speaking of the higher beings** / **jutsu** / **speaking in power ****mode**"  
'_**thinking of the higher beings**_'

* * *

**chapter VI: Mini-carnival**

Unlike those who had arrived earlier, the students from West Genetics were given little more than an hour to drop their things at the rooms they had been assigned and to freshen themselves up after their undoubtedly long flight. After that, like everyone else, they were supposed to attend some event in the main hall of the base... Naruto, even if he was Maria's partner and spent several days there already, too didn't knew much about what it will be, aside form the fact that several bigwigs will be giving speeches to the assembled Pandora and Limiters. Not exactly something he would call fun, but at least, once the official part is over, everyone was promised a great banquet.

Indeed, some officials from the Chevalier organization were giving their speeches, but those were so long and boring that the Kyuubi jinchuuriki just tuned them out mostly. And, apparently, Maria besides him was doing pretty much the same... Still, when it was Scarlet O'Hara's turn to speak, the blond sage paid some more attention as the head of the E-Pandora project was explaining why everyone was brought here and what they'll be doing there... Also, while the red-haired researcher was talking, Naruto couldn't help but notice the way she kept glancing at Maria – it was as if she was afraid of the revived proto-Pandora for some reason. Or was she afraid that Maria will not approve of her doings? Who knows... Maybe, it all was just a game of his bored mind. Still, the blond dimensional traveler filed this fact in his mind as something that he may make use of in the future...

Another speaker that Naruto had paid some attention to was Gendo Aoi, the man who was pretty much the father of the Pandora project as a whole, but he said very little, and even then those words of his were (forced) words of encouragement to the E-Pandora... But like with O'Hara, he too kept glancing at Maria, though, he did it not with fear. In his case, though, it was a mixture of hurt and ...resentment? And this time the redhead besides him was glaring back rather angrily. Apparently, something had happened between them, and Naruto wasn't sure that he wanted to know what it was. Especially when he caught Gendo looking at him with what appeared to be jealousy.

Either way, when the banquet began, those darker thoughts got moved out of the blond sage's mind, and even though there was no ramen anywhere in his sight, he still enjoyed the food greatly. He didn't even pay much mind to Maria keeping him in a relatively secluded corner of the hall – for whatever reason, the redhead didn't feel like socializing at the moment, and if he were to remember her reaction to Gendo Aoi, Naruto would even know from whom she was 'hiding'...

**~/ *** \~**

Later that evening, just as he was about to go to bed, a thought occurred to the young sage: back in his home world, even after his father's 'memory' had repaired the seal, the Kyuubi still kept talking to him, mostly by making snide remarks about what its container was doing. But now that Naruto found himself in a new world, the mighty beast was quiet. Of course, it, or at least its power, was still there as the blond jinchuuriki was using bits of Kyuubi's yoki to increase the power of his sage mode. Still, this strange quietness of the bijuu was rather unusual, and, thus, required an investigation...

Sitting comfortably on his side of the bed he shared with his red-haired partner ever since they had arrived to the Chevalier Alaska base, Naruto began meditating. Soon, he found himself in dreary and damp ill-lit corridors that for whatever reason were what formed the world of his mindscape. At the first glance everything there appeared to be like it should, so the young sage, following the pipes attached to the walls, headed to where the representation of the Kyuubi's seal was located...

After several minutes of walking, he finally found himself in front of the massive cage which looked like it was locked with nothing more than a piece of paper. Sure, Naruto now knew that in truth the representation of seal's locking mechanism was by far more complex, but it still was hard for him to believe that the piece of paper he could see wasn't the only thing that kept the mightiest of all modern bijuu at bay... Speaking of the said bijuu, even though the insides of the cage were almost pitch-black, the blond jinchuuriki still could make out the shape of the tailed beast in it. Its loud breathing wasn't exactly helping it remain unnoticed either... At first, Naruto thought that the Kyuubi was sleeping, like it did for years after the initial sealing, but the beast's breathing was too uneven for that: it was quite awake, even if it did its best to try to fool its container into thinking otherwise.

Suddenly an enormous crimson-red eye of the bijuu cracked open to see, whether or not Naruto was still there. But a moment later it closed again and the Kyuubi continued pretending to be sleeping, which was annoying its jinchuuriki a great deal... A minute later the great finally decided to stop pretending and opened its eyes as it raised its head off its paws. Seeing that the blonde was still there, the Kyuubi inquired in its roaring voice that would make lesser men flee for their lives:

"**What do you want, flesh bag?**" The young sage sighed: the nine-tails was as friendly as always. Though, considering that he was its prison for a decade and a half, it wasn't a real surprise that the bijuu didn't like him.

"Can't I just come to visit you, Kyuubi?" He asked back, making the mighty beast roar in what could be called laughter.

"**As if you ever come here not to demand for more of my power, ningen.**" The Kyuubi stated, glaring at its container. And Naruto knew that denying this would be a lie – so far every time he'd come here, it was to ask for more of the beast's yoki in order to beat some 'bad guy' or other. Or just because Jiraya had wanted him to learn to control the powers of the nine-tails...

"Maybe you're right..." The blond dimensional traveler said diplomatically. "But, still, you've been too quiet ever since that fight with that Tobi guy on our way to that Island we were supposed to check with Kumo's octopus guy."

"**That was more than three moons ago.**" The Kyuubi pointed out. "**If you're pretending to care about me, you should have come visited me earlier.**" The young shinobi sighed.

"True, but I've been quite busy there. If you haven't noticed, we aren't even in our world anymore." Naruto shot back. To his surprise, the mighty nine-tails nodded – likely, it had noticed this either. But then again, with how powerful the Kyuubi claimed to be, it really should have noticed that its container was thrown through dimensions to a new world.

"**Yeah, I know that, flesh bag. And for once I just did not feel any need to comment on your miserable life. Is that so hard to believe?**" Naruto stared at the mighty beast in front of him. The Kyuubi not wanting to degrade him over the things he was doing? Was the world coming to its end?

"After you have been criticizing pretty much every choice I make, yes it is, furball." The blond shinobi said, making a tick mark appear on the bijuu's forehead.

"**Watch your mouth, you, hairless monkey! If not for this damn cage, I'd rip you apart for this insult.**" It roared in anger, not liking to be called 'furball', as it slammed its front paws into the massive gate that separated it from its freedom. Then, several seconds later, the nine-tailed demon made a too much human-like sigh, before lying back down. "**But you still have a point, flesh bag. I never liked, or just plainly didn't understand what you were thinking here or there. And since, whether I like this or not, you kind of are an avatar of me, I could not stand you being a stupid powerless ningen that you were. But after we got transported there, I don't know... maybe whatever wisdom those toads tried to beat into your thick skull finally reached your brain, or maybe something else happened, but you started acting better from my point of view. So I saw no point in belittling you.**" For several long moments Naruto just stared dumbly at the Kyuubi, trying to process, what the beast had just said.

"What do you mean by that." The young sage asked finally. "I don't think I did anything differently from how I'd act back in our world. Why do you suddenly think that I became better, furball?" The nine-tails decided to ignore being called by that damned monicker in favor of answering the question.

"**Very well, flesh bag, I shall indulge you with my answer. First of all, you had established yourself as someone of power here. And I'll even forgive you for losing to that claw-wielding girl later on... And now you also chose a better object of affection than that pink-haired weakling of your teammate that you used to have a crush on. Whoever this 'Maria' you sleep with is, she is strong enough to be our mate, and so I approve of her.**" The great chakra beast said, it's huge blood-red eyes focused on the (comparatively) tiny human on the other side of the seal. The said human kept staring back, apparently dumbstruck by what he had heard.

"Oh really?" Was all that Naruto could say.

"**Indeed.**" The Kyuubi replied, before forcefully returning its container to the real world as it no longer wished to see him before itself...

* * *

It took the blonde a couple of seconds to recover from being forcefully ejected from his mindscape, and when he did, he found rather worried Maria sitting on the bed in front of him.

"Are you alright, Naruto-kun?" The red-haired proto-Pandora asked once she thought she was sure that he was back to the real world. "It looked like you were meditating, but... your face... it was like you were talking to someone and..." She paused trying to think of a way to put what she felt into words. The young sage, though, began answering her before she could continue:

"I'm fine." He replied. "Just had a quick talk with the Kyuubi." Seeing Maria raising her eyebrow questioningly, he elaborated: "Remember, I told you about the ninja that had demons sealed in them?" The redhead nodded – she could remember that talk they had on the train after her first outing into the Shintoshi town quite well. "Well, the Kyuubi is mine."

"Ah..." Was all that the heroine of the Second Clash could say for the moment. A couple of seconds later, though, she added: "And were you talking with the Kyuubi about, if that's not a secret?" Naruto shrugged in response as he thought that, since Maria was a part of what he and the nine-tails were talking about, she had her right to know.

"Well... I just wanted to know why it was so quiet ever since I was ...er-r transported here. And, apparently, it thought that I was acting better than usually from its perspective..." He paused there, trying to think of a good way to tell the redhead in front of him that the beast though of her as a mate material for them. In the end, having not found anything better than that, he decided to say this straightforwardly. "And it said that you were 'good enough' to be our 'mate'."

"Is that so?" Maria replied teasingly with a slight blush on her cheeks from this apparent compliment. "Well, if you keep being a good boy, Naruto-kun, I might as well show you how good a 'mate' I can be." She said, lying onto the bed and taking quite a provocative – especially with how little clothes she had on – pose. "Don't you want this, Naruto-kun?" She asked in a seductive whisper. Her answer was a blush on the blonde's face and a small trickle of blood from his nose.

**~/ *** \~**

As was pretty much expected, the mess was already filled with Pandora and Limiters by the time Maria and Naruto got there the next morning. So, the duo had to actually look for the places to sit, and it so happened that there were few at the table occupied by the E-Pandora girls.

"Good morning, colonel!.." They all stood up and saluted as one as the duo approached them. The revived redhead just waved dismissively in response.

"At ease, girls. And you can call me Maria for now." She said while taking a seat at the table, before muttering under her breath: "It's too damn early in the morning for me for these stupid protocols." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki, who took his seat by her side, couldn't help but snigger: his partner was even less of an early bird than he himself was, and he had no particular liking for rising at the crack of a dawn... For the next couple of minutes silence hanged over the table, but then the more courageous of the E-Pandora resumed chatting, and once the rest of them saw that Maria paid them absolutely no mind, they all began acting like there was no one else sharing the table with them...

"Um, colo-... Maria-taicho?" The leader of the E-Pandora – a girl of about seventeen years old with brownish-golden eyes and white, save for a single crimson-red lock over her forehead, hair – asked.

"Mhm?" The revived proto-Pandora 'replied' without looking away from her meal.

"Not that we're not honored to have you over there, but... Why did you choose to sit with us? I think that there were other places for you to sit, with more important people... and we're not the quietest bunch either." This time Maria looked up from her meal, her almost golden eyes locked onto those of the white-haired E-Pandora.

"It may be because we're more alike than you think." 'The Goddess' said cryptically, before returning to her breakfast and ignoring the follow-up questions. Naruto, of course, having been told Maria's history, knew what she meant by those words, but he respected his red-haired partner too much to give her secrets away just like that, so he too left the Evolutionary Pandora guessing the meaning of that phrase.

* * *

Just as they were leaving the mess, some Chevalier bureaucrat approached Maria, informing her that she was supposed to be attending some meeting of the organization higher-up this morning. Naruto, of course, wasn't allowed to come with her there, nor did the blond actually want to listed to some politicians arguing about some boring things. So, after a quick talk with his red-haired partner, the young sage continued exploring the base, well, those parts of it that he had access to...

And during this exploration of his, Naruto found a well-equipped gym not far away from where the swimming pool was. He didn't stop there, though, and just filed its location in his mind for future reference. A bit later and in the nearby wing, the young sage found cinema, which could fit at least two hundreds people. And like back at the West Genetics, one could actually choose what he or she wanted to watch there... The final point of his today's exploration was the medical bay. Of course, he was already briefed about where it was on the day of his arrival there, but it was the first time he saw it live. And while he thought that Elize-sensei's hospital wing was something marvelous, this one was actually like on the whole new level. And the local staff was friendly enough to give him a quick tour around the medical bay, explaining what the various machinery there was supposed to do...

When his 'tour' ended, it was almost lunch time, so Naruto headed to the mess, and rather soon he was re-joined by Maria there. And by the looks of it, the meetings of politicians were counter indicative to the redhead, as she looked rather tired after whatever debates she had to sit through this morning. At least she had a free afternoon.

And not entirely unexpectedly, the revived proto-Pandora chose to go to the pool for some of her well-earned relaxation, and Naruto got dragged along. Not that the blond sage minded it as he liked the place himself, and he wouldn't lie if he said that he would never mind seeing his red-haired partner clad in just her bikini - or any other skimpy outfit - once more...

**~/ *** \~**

The next day it was announced during the breakfast that some demonstrative fights between 'normal' and 'evolutionary' Pandora will be held that afternoon as a mini-carnival. Understandably, this event caused a lot agiotage as pretty much everyone wanted to see what these E-Pandora could do, and so the arena where the mini-carnival was supposed to take place was all packed even twenty minutes before the event was to start.  
To Naruto this whole thing, especially with a giant screen on one of the walls that was supposed to show that names of those fighting, looked much like the preliminaries of the only chuunin exams he had ever attended. Well, there weren't nearly so many observers back then, but to the young sage it felt like a very minor detail right now...

Finally, when the tension was so thick that it could be cut with a kunai, the first fight was announced. It was between a E-Pandora that was not strong even in comparison to the others, and a Pandora from Indian academy, whose name the Kyuubi jinchuuriki wasn't sure he'd ever remember. She too wasn't exceptionally strong, at least when it was a human versus human fight, but she was still well above her opponent's level, so the outcome of this fight was not unexpected: the E-Pandora didn't last more that a couple of minutes. The next several matches all went in more or less the same way with 'normal' Pandora totally dominating the arena. And this, obviously, made quite a few people lose interest in this mini-carnival.

Things became interesting again, when one of the E-Pandora, a girl named Gina, managed to cut her opponent with her bladed rings. Of course, this happened because the other Pandora, being under the impression that she didn't need to do much to win, grossly underestimated her, but, still, this made the officials a little more confident in the E-Pandora project.

Too bad, that was a one time happening, and in the next several matches 'normal' Pandora, who by now all could see that underestimating their Evolutionary 'sisters' might be a mistake, totally dominated the arena again...

Once the current fight was finished, the display showed a new pair of names: Evans Amelia vs. Mably Elizabeth. Naruto already knew the later one quite well from their time at the West Genetics, but he knew very little about the former one. Still, there were things that he was quite sure about: The white-haired girl was the undeniable leader of the E-Pandora, and she was quite powerful – sure, she was way below any 'normal' Pandora gathered here, but the Kyuubi jinchuuriki was sure that she could insert herself into the top twenty of the West Genetics' third-years if she pushed herself hard enough.

Unfortunately for Amelia, she was barely a threat to Elizabeth, and the blonde didn't even bother to summon her Stigmata Satellites, even if her opponent had a lance in her hands. The said weapon didn't help the E-Pandora at all, and neither did her ability to use double Accel, for the other girl held a significant advantage in speed that allowed her to steer clear of Amelia's attacks while landing some hits of her own on the whitehead. Still, despite being at a clear disadvantage, the E-Pandora refused to go down with the stubbornness that strongly reminded the Kyuubi jinchuuriki of both Rock Lee and his younger self... Eventually, though, Amelia took one hit too many and could not continue fighting anymore. Still, even if she lost – and quite badly as her opponent remained unarmed throughout the fight – she had shown that E-Pandora too had some power...

* * *

"Elizabeth-san." Naruto who, along with Maria, was standing there with the West Genetics' delegation, said, when the blond Pandora finally rejoined them. "I think that maybe you shouldn't have used just your bare hands in your fight."

"Why?" The Mably heiress asked simply.

"I have seen her type in the past: Amelia is actually a proud person, even if she doesn't act up on that for the sake of her comrades. Losing to you like that... it hurt her unnecessary." The young sage replied. "And if I'm reading this all right, they intend to maybe integrate these Evolutionary Pandora into the ranks of the 'canon' ones. Do you really wish to have an ally that resents you for being strong?" Elizabeth gave him a thoughtful look.

"I... I never thought about it like that." She finally said after a couple of seconds later. Then she made another pause, before continuing. "I think I shall visit her when she's better and apologize." Sure, she was a proud girl herself, but sometimes sacrifices needed to be made...

"Um, Naruto-san..." Chiffon's voice broke into the little world that surrounded the two blondes... Actually, Maria, who was listening to the two, seemed to be in there as well, as the she felt a very strong connection with the E-Pandora: one upon a time she too was just a normal girl. Or at least she thought of herself as one for it seemed that she some innate powers since her birth, and it were those powers that allowed her survive the transformation into 'the Goddess'... The Kyuubi jinchuuriki looked up at the brown-haired girl, silently asking her what she wanted. "It's your turn now." Chiffon said.

"What?" Naruto couldn't help but exclaim upon seeing his name on the screen. They wanted him to fight some E-Pandora named Rachel Brown. "Oh well... Guess, I have no choice." He said, before approaching the edge of tribune and jumping straight down onto the arena floor, his shinobi training keeping him completely safe despite a significant difference in heights.

"I will not fight a Limiter." Was the first thing that he heard from his opponent.

"Fortunately for you, I'm not a Limiter." The young sage replied, as he studied the girl he was supposed to fight. She was rather plain gal with brownish hair and fairly-tanned skin. And despite now vicious her fan-blades looked, ms. Brown didn't appear to be much of a threat. Of course, this didn't mean that he will let himself underestimate her, but... Well, it didn't feel like she was capable of anything that he couldn't counter even without opening his inner gates...

"And what are you then?" Rachel asked then, doing her own study of her supposed opponent. Unfortunately for her, she did not posses the same sensor powers as he did, so she could only see a blond well-built teen in rather strange clothes.

"I highly doubt that calling myself a 'ninja' will give you any form of insight into what I'm capable of, and there really is no time for any sort of lecture... So, let's do the fighting." Here Naruto made a short pause. "And as this is supposed to be your chance to show off, for the first five minutes I will try to stay on defensive. After that, well..." He fell silent there. Apparently, though, there was no need for him to say anything else, as the E-Pandora got his message: she had five minutes to show the Chevalier officials what she was capable of. And so she attacked... Too bad for her, Naruto had been trained to fight humans for almost a decade, so he her horizontal swipe was easy for him to defend against: he merely brushed the blade away with the armor plating strapped to his hand. Rachel's second attack – a stab towards his midsection – was dealt with in a similar fashion.

* * *

Back at the tribunes, people were watching Naruto's fight with interest: whether the blonde himself wanted this or not, he was now known to everyone with at least some connections to the Chevalier organization as at the only non-Pandora to ever kill a Nova, so, understandably, people wanted to know what else he was capable of...

"He's not taking her serious." Elizabeth said aloud, though mostly to herself. And Maria, who had been standing next to her, paid enough attention to her surroundings to hear that. Of course, it was quite obvious to the redhead that her partner wasn't even trying to fight for real at the moment, but she still felt compelled to as the following question:

"What makes you think that?" Maybe she shouldn't have, as the only her great self-control prevented her from doing a facepalm from the answer she received:

"Naruto-san isn't taking his cloak off." It wasn't the casual manner in which Naruto deflected the attacks coming at him. It wasn't the fact that he wasn't even moving from the spot where he was standing. No, it was that damn cloak! For the first time in a long time – counting those years she had spent petrified or not – Maria found nothing to say back...

* * *

"Your five minutes are up." Naruto said to his opponent as he suddenly caught the girl's extended arm in his vice-like grip, before throwing her back across the arena. He let her recover, before he continued speaking: "But don't worry, I will not use any of my anti-Nova techniques against you – those are far too lethal for our spar." After a short pause, during which the young sage made several handseal at the speed was quite inhuman, he spoke again: "Now then, let's see how you handle extreme environment."

Before Rachel could consciously wonder what her opponent intended to do, she found herself brought to her knees by an invisible and quite overwhelming force. It took her another couple of seconds – truly, Pandora, even the Evolutionary ones, had incredible endurance – to recover enough to raise back up and speak again:

"You... You are controlling gravity?" Naruto chuckled but shook his head.

"No, and I doubt anyone can tame this incredible force of nature. I'm simply emulating it by creating a zone of increased air pressure around you. And, of course, it's not really useful in combat as it takes quite some time to initiate, and I have less energy-consuming means to end the fight at my disposal, but..." The effect the technique had on the girl – three g was no joke – was enough to drive Naruto's point home. "And since we've used quite a lot of everyone's time, I believe, we should give your comrades their chance to shine." With these words the Kyuubi jinchuuriki canceled the jutsu. The sudden disappearance of the pressure had as great an effect on the E-Pandora girl as did its appearance. And by the time she recovered a couple of seconds later, she was already surrounded by a ring of stone spikes that the concrete floor of the arena was warped into with their sharp pointy tips pointed at her neck. "I win." Once his opponent accepted her defeat, Naruto returned the arena floor to its original state, before shunshin'ing to where Maria was standing.

"And I never thought that you'd turn out to be a damn hypocrite." Was the first thing that he heard when he got there. A moment later his vision got filled with a annoyed and more than a little angry Elizabeth. "After all that you've said to me, you go and defeat your own opponent in an even more humiliating way." The blonde Pandora hissed, while the object of her ire raised his hands in front of his chest defensively.

"Easy there." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki tried to defend himself. "Unlike you, I got an opponent, whom I'd squash if I fought even half-seriously. Did you want me to use sage mode on her or something? I think you still have troubles with it without Andre there to assist you." That might have been a bit low, but it did remind Elizabeth that the difference between Naruto's level and the level of the E-Pandora he had just fought was far too great. "And it's not like I sent her to the medical bay. Sure, I might have given her a bruise or two, but..." Yes, unlike Amelia, Rachel left the arena on her own and without any assistance.

"Fine." The Mably heiress said sharply, accepting her 'defeat' as she didn't want this to escalate into a shouting match, and could also see that the blond sage in front of her too had a point. Plus, there still were three E-Pandora who hadn't fought yet, and she didn't really want to miss what they could do: just like Naruto had said, these girls were supposed to become their comrades in the upcoming battles with Nova, and it was always good to know what your comrade was capable of...

* * *

That's all folks  
leave me a **Review**!


	7. Mark IV

At long last, I've completed the seventh chapter of the "_**Antifreeze fox**_". Hopefully, I won't make you wait this long for the next update, but with how my semester at university is turning out, I'm not sure I will be able to update soon... Anyway, enjoy the chapter!

*** Review response**:  
**karthik9**, **edboy4926**, **Wyrtha**, **Dark Insomniacs**, **Dymian**, **Nanashi113**, **Dragonskyt**, **sh8ad8ow**, **BattleCharger**, **wayswitch**, **Toby860**, **Cloves**, **BladePhoenix41**, **ForeverYoung97**, **KailSakray**, **Dudtheman**, **OverPowered**, **Antoinette Castellan**, **Cenright**, **DarkPirateKing69**, **harlequin320**, **dangerverse**, **jebest**, **missourijack**, **wankelrotaryengine**, thanks for your reviews, folks!  
**Hellfire44**, to be honest, I don't know what to think about this all. Though it's quite clear now that Kazuha was quite a pervy girl for she was the one who 'organized' this whole thing.  
**kalakauai**, 1) on the ship en route to the turtle island. 2) it may be possible, but I do not plan on going anywhere near it in the story. 3) Freezing field as a telepathy medium doesn't work on Naruto as he has no stigmata in his body. 3a) what secrets? 4) not anymore, though it took me some time to completely recover from the hardware failure in early June.  
**RE5 forever**, u-um... this review needs some proper punctuation. But, anyway, no: I do not have time to write yet another story at the moment, and I didn't find _**Highschool DxD**_ interesting, so I do not intend to write anything connected with it.  
**Gbds**, well, there aren't many of these to begin with ;)

*** Jutsu list**: **Shinobi techniques**:  
**Rougoku no fuuin** - (unknown rank) Prison seal - Prevents target from moving (in any way). Essentially, the same seal that Danzou used on Sasuke.  
*** Jutsu list**: **Pandora-Limiter techniques**:  
**Accel turn** - increases speed of a Pandora. 5x acceleration allows one to move with a speed close to sound barrier. Not all Pandora can use this technique.  
**Tempest turn** - 'cloning' through sheer speed. So far the shown limit is 10 copies. Not all Pandora can use this technique.

* * *

**Disclaimer**: I DO NOT own "_**Naruto**_" or "_**Freezing**_". No profit is being made. Oh, and I borrowed some names from other anime & manga. I don't own those either.

"speaking"  
'_thinking_'  
"**speaking of the higher beings** / **jutsu** / **speaking in power ****mode**"  
'_**thinking of the higher beings**_'

* * *

**chapter VII: Mark IV**

Naruto wasn't sure how this did happen so fast, but by the morning after the mini-carnival he already had a new and well-known among others moniker: the Editor. It was a rather nice one – especially compared to the names he had been called before becoming Konoha genin – so the blond sage didn't mind it. But it still made him wonder, how so many different people could agree on something so quickly.

Aside from that, though, nothing of interest was happening at the base, nor was scheduled to happen in the next couple of days: the technicians needed time to finish the preparations for some synchronization tests, while the high-ups of the Chevalier organization were discussing the finer details of the said tests. This, of course, gave the E-Pandora some time to recover from their, often quite devastating loses, in the mock battles. The rest of the base's guests though... well, while those more sapient were making use of the local training facilities, most were just reclining, confident in themselves.

Maria, not being a part of the later group, when she wasn't busy with her duties as a colonel, could be found either in the gym or at the pool, and Naruto, who himself never shied away from training, was all too happy to join his red-haired partner there. Though, while he was concentrating more on his shinobi skills, 'the Goddess' was working mostly on her plasticity, and she did that in a way that sometimes left the blond sage in the need of a cold shower...

**~/ *** \~**

It was evening of the third day since the mini-carnival, when the young sage decided to have another talk with the Kyuubi. This time, Naruto was hoping to talk the mighty demon into willingly helping him, should he find himself facing Novas that were beyond his capabilities. No, sure, if its container's life was in danger, the nine-tails would step in, even if just to keep itself from perishing as well, but the blond sage was positive that if the Kyuubi was actually working with him, they could achieve better results... He just needed to explain this to the bijuu.

* * *

Arriving to the maze of the dreary corridors that were the representation of his subconscious, Naruto headed straight to where the Kyuubi's cage was. And the mighty beast appeared to be expecting him, its two huge blood-red eyes staring intently at the blond sage.

"**What brings you here this time, flesh bag?**" The bijuu asked rather rudely, getting straight to the point. Sighing softly, the young jinchuuriki answered:

"Well..." Despite having an idea what he wanted from the demon, Naruto actually haven't thought about the words that he should use in his negotiations with it. Thus, right now he found himself not really sure about what he should say. And, of course, the Kyuubi wasn't exactly alright with it.

"**Out with it, ningen, or I'm going back to sleep!**" The nine-tails said as it glared at its container. The blond shinobi sighed again.

"Um... You see, so far the enemies I had to face weren't beyond my own capabilities..." The bijuu nodded, mostly to itself. "But no one said that the things will be like this forever. One day, I may find myself facing something that I can't beat without resorting to your power." The Kyuubi lowered its head to bring it closer to the level of the piny human that was in front of it.

"**And? We both know that I will not perish this soon, even if it means I have to help the waste of space that you are.**" The demon growled, making Naruto unconsciously take a step away from the beast's cage.

"That may be so, but we both know that when you try to force your 'help' into me, it has some serious aftereffects. Wouldn't it be better, if you allowed me to use your power more freely, if the situation requires it?" The blond sage asked. The Kyuubi was silent for a moment, before it spoke again:

"**And what is in for me there, ningen?**" The nine-tailed demon asked. "**I won't have you leeching my power without giving anything back.**" Naruto paused, trying to think of something that he could offer to the bijuu.

"What about the knowledge that you're the strongest being in not one but two universes?" He tried weakly... The Kyuubi let out a deep sigh, before crossing its front paws and laying its head atop of them.

"**And that is all you can offer? It absolutely won't do!**" A pause. "**And I never was the strongest one in our home world. Both _the father_ and _the mother_ of mine and my brethren were on the whole different level from me. And let's not forget the whole court of Kami.**" The blond shinobi looked quite confused by what he had just heard.

"Father? Mother?" He asked and, before he could say anything else, the Kyuubi growled at him, making him shut up quickly.

"**You should have at least heard about the father, ningen. After all, he did create the world of shinobi as you know it.**" For several seconds Naruto had a puzzled expression on his face as he tried to recall anything and everything he did learn in the history classes. And he couldn't find anything about the man the Kyuubi was talking about in those memories. Then his brief meeting with 'Tobi' during the times of the Kage summit came to his mind.

"You're talking about Rikkudou Sennin?" The young sage asked.

"**...It appears that there is some brain in that head of yours.**" The nine-tails replied. "**Yes, the sage of six paths was the one who created me and eight of my brethren from the being we call _the mother_.**" It continued. "**You might have heard about her as well: Ame no Hitotsu no Kami, Atara Deidara-Bocchi, the Juubi – you, humans, gave her many names.**" Then the Kyuubi shook his head. "**And why I am even telling you all this, flesh bag?**" Naruto just shrugged as he knew no answer to this question... There was an uneasy silence that lasted for several seconds, before the bijuu spoke again: "**But I do know with what you can pay me back for my ...assistance in your fights.**" The blonde perked up upon hearing this.

"Yes?"

"**Those sages gave you the key to my seal, did they not?**" The mighty beast spoke. "**Yes, right now is not the time for it, but once this wave of alien attackers end, you will release from the seal.**" Ignoring shocked and fearful face of its container, the Kyuubi continued. "**I still feel my connection to that damn ox of eight tails, meaning if I were to 'die' here, I'd reform back in the world where I was created. I will even promise not to attack anyone here... So, my power for your freedom from me, how does it sound?**" Naruto thought about this for some time, which felt like eternity in the dreary world of his subconscious. Of course, the blonde knew that he shouldn't trust the beast this much, but as he himself said, soon he may found himself facing an enemy that he wouldn't be able to defeat without resorting to using the Kyuubi's power. Maybe he should accept this deal...

"Alright, I'll do that." He said, looking into the demon's red eyes.

"**Very well. The deal is concluded.**" And following those words, the young sage once again experienced less than pleasant feeling of being booted out of his own subconscious...

**~/ *** \~**

A quiet ringing of her intercom made doctor Scarlet O'Hara look away from her computer monitors, habitually minimizing all of the windows with the information that was for her eyes only: there were some things that even the Chevalier organization leaders didn't need to know about. Not yet, at least.

"What's it?" She asked as she pressed a button on the intercom... Apparently, Amelia was here to see her. '_This was bound to happen sooner or later_' The red-haired scientist thought, shaking her head. Then she gave her reply: "Let her in, please." Just a couple of seconds later the doors of her office slid open, allowing the white-haired girl in.

"Ah... I can come back later if you're busy..." Amelia said in a hushed voice when she saw the head of the E-Pandora project sitting behind her monitors with a slight frown on her face.

"It's fine." Doctor O'Hara said, standing up from her armchair. To be honest, she was even thankful that ms. Evans chose this time to pay her a visit – all those data she had to sort through was giving her a headache, so a small break was quite welcome. "Sit down." The red-haired scientist said, gesturing for her guest to take a seat on the armchair in front of her table... Of course, Amelia remained standing. "Coffee?"

"Ah, I'm fine!" She replied hastily, waving her hands in front of herself. The head of the E-Pandora project just shrugged, before pouring herself a mug.

"I know why you are here." Doctor O'Hara said with a small sigh, causing Amelia to stiffen even more. "The use of Mark IV was decided by the committee and it is going to happen no matter what." The white-head seemed to shrink when she heard those word.

"I didn't come here... to ask for something as selfish as not using it. I... was ready for everything when I became a part of this project..." Amelia whispered while looking down and to the side, while hugging herself with her right hand. It made her look so small and vulnerable that even doctor O'Hara, who prided herself on being a cold-hearted scientist, couldn't help but want to comfort the girl as the 'mother' aspect of her acted up... Still, the red-haired researcher had an image to uphold.

"So then what? What is it you wanted?" She asked, maybe unnecessarily-harshly, succeeding only in making the whitehead even more uncomfortable.

"Is... Is Mark IV a revised version of... the Mark III you used before?" Amelia asked, gradually switching from whispering to all but shouting. The white-haired E-Pandora certainly had no good memories about Mark III – while it did boost her powers, it almost killed her too, and it took away her pretty red hair, leaving just a single lock as a reminder of the pains she had to live through... Doctor O'Hara patiently listened to the girl's rant with a neutral expression on her face.

"Mark IV is completely different from Mark III." She finally said when Amelia ran out of breath. "It was created based on the original Pandora's official data the Committee gave us. And while I can't completely guarantee lack of side-effects, nothing like _that_ should happen this time. Mark IV is much safer and quite more efficient than III. It's a whole new medicine... Don't worry, I will do everything in my power to keep you all safe – you're all my precious test subjects after all." The whitehead was quite for several seconds, while the red-haired researcher was trying to figure out what possessed her to use these reassurances, instead of just ordering the E-Pandora to go into the test. Regardless, Amelia seemed to have accepted her answer.

"Thank you, professor. I'll explain this to the girls." The white-haired E-Pandora said with a small bow, before turning around and walking up to the door. She paused there. "And... professor, let's make the E-Project a success, alright?" She added with a small gentle smile, before walking out, the mechanical door slamming close behind her...

Doctor O'Hara placed her mug on the table and sighed, seemingly shrinking as she did that. She managed to avert the fall out between the E-Pandora and the Chevaliers this time, but she also knew that Mark IV was not as perfect as she said it was. And while the chances that something similar to what had happened with Amelia will occur again were low, Murphy will ensure that the catastrophe will happen at the worst possible time, possibly placing hundreds of innocent lives in danger.

The red-haired scientist balled her hands into fists. Even if the E-Project was interesting and she could honestly say that she liked working on it, she knew that the E-Pandora will never truly be a match to the real ones, and with how Nova attacks were getting more and more powerful, Scarlet wasn't sure that even someone as strong as Amelia will be of any help on the battlefield...

No, the humanity needed a far more powerful weapon against the alien invaders, and she was creating it, hiding her true works behind the E-Project as that fool, Gendo Aoi, and his fraction of the Chevalier organization will never allow her to do that officially. Idiots! Do they not understand that only by using all available resources to create a perfect weapon against Nova the humanity could survive?

Sighing again, doctor O'Hara decided that she should visit her secret laboratory, where_ that weapon_ was being created. Of course, she was sure that nothing noteworthy had happened there in those fifteen minutes that passed since she last viewed the data feedback from there; and _the girls_ there weren't _alive_ yet – they will never know whether their creator came to visit them or not – but the red-haired scientist decided to do that anyway, more for the peace of her own mind...

It took her a couple of minutes of walking through some 'secret' corridors of the base, but Scarlet eventually found herself in a large hall, filled with loads of expensive equipment and three dozens of tanks. Inside each of these tanks there was a girl, appearing to be seventeen or so, with red hair and aristocratic face: a clone of Maria 'the Goddess' Lancelot. They were to be humanity's ultimate weapon against the Nova... Doctor O'Hara approached the nearest tank and gently placed her hand on the cool glass near to where the clone's – her child's, almost – hand was.

"Soon, it will be your time to shine..."

**~/ *** \~**

Even though Maria was a colonel and just a highly respected Chevaliers operative, even she – and Naruto by extension – wasn't allowed into the area where the synchronization tests were held. So, she knew about as much as the next person about what was going on there. Namely, that the Mark IV could boost E-Pandora's abilities to the levels of the normal one. Still, the redhead wasn't stupid enough to believe that this boost could be permanent: human body had its limits, and pushing someone over those limits for a prolonged time eventually led to the subject's mutilation or even death.

Thus, as three days had passed since the (successful) synchronization test and the E-Pandora used in it wasn't seen anywhere, 'the Goddess' had her strong suspicions about what state the poor girl was in at the moment. At best, Gina will have to spend some time recovering from the ordeal, at worst, she will have to pay for those minutes of being powerful with her life...

Still, even if she was worrying about the girl – it reminded her all too much about the first experiments in creating Pandora, through which she alone lived – Maria knew she could do nothing to help Gina, and so she continued with her daily routines as if everything was alright.

Thus, at the moment, the redhead having her nightly relaxation at the pool, floating lazily in the warm water on her back. Yet, she couldn't find any peace for her heart, as some sense of foreboding kept returning to her. And her partner – who, apparently, couldn't keep his eyes away from her scantly-clad body – was in pretty much the same situation with his sixth sense acting up. Their intuition, as it turned out, wasn't mistaken this time: suddenly a siren sounded throughout the entire base.

"This is an announcement about the state of emergency!" A loud artificial voice said, completely drowning all other sounds, even the alarm siren. "All Pandora have to stand by their designated positions! This is not a drill! All Pandora, except for those whose names will be called should stand by their designated positions! Repeat, this is not a drill!" Somehow, it took Maria just six seconds to reach the edge of the pool from its center, and get out of the water. And by the time she was finally standing on a solid surface again, Naruto had already created an solid illusion of his battle gear over himself and he also had entered his sage mode already.

"Where is it?" 'The Goddess' asked, ignoring the order to head to her designated position, aka, the command center. Even if the base buildings were very sturdy, that momentary flicker of the lights was enough to tell everyone with half a brain that Nova was attacking already. And there was only one explanation as to how it could appear without a warning: this 'Nova' was actually a Pandora whose stigmata corrosion went past the point of no return... Naruto scanned the area of the base, quickly finding the Nova-like signature.

"Left the test chambers of the laboratories, and, if I'm not mistaken, she is heading towards the E-Pandora's quarters." He made a short pause, before adding: "And it looks like she still has her human mind, even if her body is corrupted." Maria nodded, before materializing some clothes for herself. Sure, these would never be a match for the real ones, but going to the lockers and putting those on will be such a waste of time right now... "She goes in a straight line, and the walls are slowing her down quite a bit. If we head to the E-Pandora's quarters, we will get there at about the same time with her."

"Let's go." The redhead said, and the two of them hurried towards their chosen destination...

* * *

Needless to say, the E-Pandora were the scared the most when the alarm sounded. And they too, Amelia especially, had their suspicions about what or, rather, who that 'Nova' was. Yet, they had to follow the orders, which in their case meant that they were to guard their living quarters and the nearby storage area. Not the most glorious task, but...

It all became even worse, when they felt the 'Nova' approaching: the weak freezing field that did nothing more that chill them up, and the sounds of the stone being smashed as the thing was laying its own way through the base's buildings.

The Evolutionary Pandora readied themselves for a fight as they could feel the 'Nova' getting close, but something destroying the wall into the room where they were was enough to stun them for a second, and the sight that greeted them, once the dust began settling, completely destroyed their not so high to begin with morale. The 'Nova' was no one other than Gina, deformed but still recognizable. Her skin was turning crystallized and light blue, falling off in some places, and there was a number of crystalline outgrowths on her back. Yet, despite her less than human appearance, one could see that her eyes were still those of a human...

"You..." Gina whispered in a raspy voice. "Could it be that you're..." She coughed up some blood, which was already losing its human red color. "A... Amelia..." Apparently, the fight to stay conscious was also making the poor girl unable to hold onto any thought of hers for long. "Mark... Mark IV was..." She got interrupted again, this time by a door to her right being blown off its hinges.

"Looks like we're right on time." Naruto said as he walked into the room with Maria being just a step behind him. Gina seemed to be less than pleased with the appearance of these two, and so she attacked, her suddenly materialized long katar blade aimed towards the blond sage's head. But despite her speed that easily rivaled that of a** triple Accel**, she couldn't land a hit: the Kyuubi jinchuuriki sidestepped the attack, before sending her crashing into the wall with a palm strike to her back.

"Wha-?" Amelia and four other E-Pandora who were in the room gasped. They could barely follow Gina's movements, yet the blond newcomer appeared to have no problems with the girl's speed and treated her attack like it was nothing.

"**Rougoku no fuuin!**" Naruto said, landing another palm strike on the almost-turned-Nova girl, this time though, she wasn't thrown anywhere. Instead, black lines, formed by multitudes of small characters formed on her body, magically rooting her to the floor where she stood. '_Hey, Kyuubi!_'

'_**What do you need, fleshbag?**_' The nine-tails replied from within the depths of its cage. '_**Need my help already? Against her? You're even more pathetic than I though.**_' Naruto's eye twitched.

'_Shut up, stupid kitsune!_' Taking a deep breath to calm down – thankfully, the paralyzing seal worked on Gina pretty well, allowing his time to concentrate on other things – he continued: '_But I do indeed need your help, yet not against her. Her mind is still human, your power can restore her body as well. It takes more strength to heal than to destroy. Don't you want to have the knowledge that you're the strongest being out there, Kyuubi?_' The bijuu growled back at him.

'_**You think that you can flatter me into following your bid, ningen?**_' A pause, long enough to make Naruto uncomfortable. '_**Very well, I shall give you my power this one time. Show everyone my power!**_' With those words, the mightiest of the tailed demons gave its container a small fraction of its power. A fraction that was untainted by the beast's blood-thirsty conscious... In the real world, a demonic hand, made of light-orange, almost golden, energy formed around Naruto's right hand.

"Amelia-san." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki said, turning to the said whitehead. "Since you're the apparent leader here, I shall let you decide your comrade's fate." The addressed E-Pandora gulped nervously. "You can let her die as a Pandora or live as a human." It was clear the Amelia wanted to say that she wanted Gina to live, but she herself was no fool...

"I sense a 'but' here." The white-haired girl said instead. Naruto sighed, lowering his head.

"Yes, there is one." A short pause. "I may be able to overcharge her immune system, forcing it to reject all Nova tissue, but the stress from this may be something that her body can't handle. And, should she survive, she will never be able to be a Pandora again." The blonde explained. Then he added: "And, try to make the choice soon, my seal can't keep her paralyzed forever, and her power as a Nova only grows with each passing second..." Amelia was thoughtful for a couple of moments, before giving her answer:

"Let her live as a human!" She said with determination burning in her amber eyes.

"Very well." The blonde stated, before turning back to Gina, who, by now, was visibly fighting against the paralysis of the seal. Yet, before he could do anything, someone else made their presence known.

"What are you waiting for? This is a Nova and it must be eliminated right away!" Charlotte Bonaparte said loudly. Then, seeing no immediate reaction to her words, she herself attacked, splitting easily into ten copies, each wielding a pair of knuckle knives... Unfortunately for her, Naruto was still in his sage mode and could easily pick out the real her among the 'illusions'... Master of **Tempest turn** she may be, Charlotte couldn't use even **double Accel** well, so, she couldn't do anything to escape the Kyuubi jinchuuriki grabbing her by her wrist. And a moment later she was flung against the wall with enough power to make the concrete dot and break, while her copies disappeared.

"Stand down, girl, the situation is being handled." Maria hissed as she moved in front of the younger Pandora, making it impossible for her to make another attempt at attacking Gina... Nodding a 'thank you' to his partner, Naruto turned his attention back to the struggling with her humanity E-Pandora. Placing his yoki-covered hand onto her chest, he willed the purified demonic energies into her body.

For several long moments nothing seemed to happen, but then the first signs of Gina's immune system fighting against the stigmata corrosion began appearing. At first it wasn't much, but as the blond sage pushed more of the Kyuubi's power into the girl's body, the results were getting more and more noticeable. And while seeing Gina's face twisted by a silent scream of pain was really tearing Amelia's heart apart, the white-haired E-Pandora could understand that she shouldn't interfere with this...

No one was sure, how much time had passed, but in the end Gina returned to being human again, though she still looked like shit with all those missing patches of her skin and other ugly reminders of how close she had come to becoming a Nova... Once Naruto was confident that his 'healing' had the desired effect on the girl, he stopped pushing the Kyuubi's yoki into her, allowing her to finally slip into peaceful unconsciousness. And just as Gina bonelessly slid down against the wall, he allowed the 'demonic arm' of his to dissipate. He felt so damn tired and a little numb in his right arm from this, yet he was smiling: the life he had just saved was worth all this!

**~/ *** \~**

In the dead of the night a shadow crept through the hospital wing of the Alaskan Chevalier base, looking for a certain person there. And finding the said person wasn't all that hard as, aside from a couple of technicians that had been harmed during her rampage, Gina was the only patient there... The shadow-covered figure approached the girl's bed an pulled a syringe filled with transparent liquid out of its pocket.

"This is nothing personal, but you know too much about the Mark IV fiasco... You must be silenced. Sorry." The figure said in a low whisper, before making an injection. The next morning Gina will be found dead, but without any evidence to prove it otherwise, it will be ruled out as an unfortunate but completely natural death... With its mission accomplished, the shadow turned around to leave, but paused to give the girl's hair a motherly stroke. Then it walked away, disappearing into the night...

* * *

That's all folks  
leave me a **Review**!


	8. Alaskan pogrom

Here's the newest chapter of the "_**Antifreeze fox**_". Enjoy!

*** Review response**:  
**Zikarn Krais**, hope you're not that much disappointed by what I do to her this chapter.  
**sh8ad8ow**, **AstralJean**, **edboy4926**, **G3neSyS**, **Dudtheman**, **Kamen Rider Arashi**, **karthik9**, **Arc-Angel-Of-Fire**, ** 55**, **BladePhoenix41**, **Thanatoss**, **ManlyMonk**, **Arct1cfox**, **Akuma-Heika**, **Killmekos**, **Blackholelord**, **Zobx**, **Gbds**, **Castage**, **ArthurB**, thank you for your reviews, folks!  
**serialkeller**, Naruto can't be all-alert 24/7. Hopefully, though, he will get redeemed a bit this chapter.  
**sabery**, **kalakauai**, **DigitalButton**, **zrodeathwing**, I neither confirm nor deny anything )  
**Lord Anime**, there are some characters that have to die. And they die. I will remove more Pandora from the ranks with the Alaskan battle than the canon did, but there will actually be less deaths this *time*  
**Rixxell Stryfe**, there is no rebellion arc in this story ;)  
**Alex the Digital HellReaper**, maybe in an omake next chapter... this one is long enough without them. but this is definitely a worthy idea )

*** Jutsu list**: **Shinobi techniques**:  
**Kage bunshin** - (B-rank) Shadow clone - creates solid doppelgangers of the user, using just his/her chakra. Clones can do all of the creator's techniques, but will dispel after receiving any significant damage. Destroyed or dispelled clones give their memories to their creator.  
**Rasen shuriken** - (S-rank) Spiral shuriken - wind-empowered rasengan, that tears anything within its detonation zone to shreds. Can be used as a ranged attack, when outside of the freezing field.  
**Rasengan** - (A-rank) Spiral sphere - a ball of quickly-rotating chakra that acts like a grinder. This technique is capable of dealing tremendous amount of damage, but can only be used in melee.  
**Ura shishou** - (unknown rank) Reverse four images seal - Anything that happens to be within about 50m from the seal when it is activated will be permanently sealed away.  
*** Jutsu list**: **Pandora-Limiter techniques**:  
**Accel turn** - increases speed of a Pandora. 5x acceleration allows one to move with a speed close to sound barrier. Not all Pandora can use this technique.  
**Tempest turn** - 'cloning' through sheer speed. So far the shown limit is 10 copies. Not all Pandora can use this technique.  
**Illusion turn** - special high-end skill, unique to Chiffon. Nothing is really known about it, but when Chiffon is using it, she appears to be teleporting around.  
**freezing field** - special field deployed by Nova and stronger Limiters that nullifies almost all forces (save for gravity, maybe). freezing field also can sink chakra from shinobi techniques, making them nigh useless (some of the more chakra-intense techniques can survive for a couple of seconds, before being drained into uselessness).

*** Rant**: I keep up to date with everything that goes on in both manga, and I will say this: I'm not going to change/rewrite my Maria into something closer to canon. Here, she not some alien messenger, but a human that managed to survive Nova flesh being implanted into her and gained great powers from that. My Maria has 'assimilation' power. And so does Amelia, actually. This is why (at least in this story) she gained a power up from Mark III and another from clone's flesh this chapter. No, Amelia won't become an uber fighter, but she will jump to the level of a good conventional Pandora.

* * *

**Disclaimer**: I DO NOT own "_**Naruto**_" or "_**Freezing**_". No profit is being made. Oh, and I borrowed some names from other anime & manga. I don't own those either.

"speaking"  
'_thinking_'  
"**speaking of the higher beings** / **jutsu** / **speaking in power ****mode**"  
'_**thinking of the higher beings**_'

* * *

**chapter VIII: The Alaskan pogrom**

Of course, given who Maria was, no one was going to leave a dark mark on her record unless she did something with really disastrous effects. Thus, the only 'punishment' she received for going after the transforming Pandora instead of guarding the command center like she was supposed to was a scolding from the Chevalier higher-ups... Naruto couldn't be punished for this as well, since de jure he was Maria's underlying. Yet, he still had to listen to the politicians bitching about people not following their wishes to the letter. What a waste of time! Especially since it all was happening at four o'clock in the damn morning...

As going to bed was pretty much useless at the moment, 'the Goddess' decided that they could as well finish what they were doing before this whole fiasco started, and so she dragged her blond sage back to the pool. Not that he resisted...

The pool was wonderfully devoid of anyone but the two of them, possibly for the first time since all those delegations from various academies had arrived to the base, and with the main lights dimmed to save the power, the place looked even a tiny bit romantic. Yet, this was quite enough to put Maria into some playfully-seductive mood as she decided to forgo the top half of her bikini...

The sight of the red-haired goddess covered in water droplets as she rose from the pool, Naruto was sure, was the hottest thing he had seen in his life, and judging by the light smile the proto-Pandora had on her face, she was quite satisfied with the effects she had on him. And she actually found herself, a faint blush blossoming on her face, looking forward to giving her partner a hand – or more – in dealing with the 'problem' she and her mostly naked body created...

**~/ *** \~**

Rather unexpectedly, the people in the mess this morning weren't bursting with activity, discussing the events of the previous night. Then again, as the state of emergency was canceled only after three o'clock in the morning, pretty much everyone was rather sleepy. The E-Pandora were the most obvious exception there, what had happened to one of them clearly was the reason and the glares they were sending towards O'Hara and her scientific crew were a proof of that... Thankfully, it didn't look like the situation will change for something more violent without some sort of a provocation, so everyone was allowed to carry on their day-to-day duties as usual.

The problem, though, didn't wait for too long, before rearing its ugly head: just before the lunch, it was announced that Gina Papleton – despite everything that medical stuff tried – died earlier this morning from the complications that followed her transformation back into a human. To most assembled Pandora and Limiters, this sounded like something believable, but Naruto, being the one who did that transformation, knew better – the only thing that could have caused the girl's death was her immune system's failure, but even if that had happened, the local medics would have been able to keep her alive for another day or two. This left two possibilities: either no one gave a damn, whether she lived or not, or she had been purposely euthanized to keep some information secret... And Maria, with whom he had shared his suspicions, was quite agreeable with his theories, but neither of them had enough resources and political power to launch an independent investigation into this.

Speaking of things that needed investigation: during the 'hunt' after Nova-turned Gina, Naruto had sensed about three dozens of weak signatures that felt suspiciously like Maria somewhere on the edge of sensing ability. At that time he had more important things to concatenate on, so he ignored them, but after the situation had been resolved, he couldn't find those signatures again, even though he was looking specifically for them. The Kyuubi jinchuuriki was quite positive that those hadn't been just a trick of his mind, but... he had absolutely no proof that he could give to others that there was anything, so he decided not to voice his suspicions about those yet.

Back to the situation with the E-Pandora; the announcement of Gina's death indeed caused a lot of unrest among them, but thanks to the very thought over decision to give the fallen girl a proper burial, the Chevalier staff managed to prevent this crisis form evolving into something as catastrophic as a rebellion. A rebellion that would not only be a waste of human resources, but also a political disaster for the organization...

* * *

Sometime in the mid-afternoon that day Maria was summoned to the meeting for the squad leaders, once again leaving Naruto to his own devices. And since he didn't want to completely squander his time as he waited for his partner's return, the blond jinchuuriki headed to the gym.

And it looked like even the events of the previous night didn't make the Limiters and the conventional Pandora realize that this all was not a vacation for them: the young sage could see none of them here working on improving themselves – only a handful of E-Pandora were there in the gym. Shrugging at the apparent overconfidence of the majority of the base's guests, the blond demon container started doing his own light warm up. Light for him, that is...

Naruto was on his second to last lap around the hall, when a certain whitehead showed up in the gym. Noticing him, she froze for a moment, but then, dropping her thing on the closest trainer, jogged towards him. Seeing this, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki graciously slowed down, making it easier for Amelia to keep up with him.

"U-Uzumaki-san?" The E-Pandora said just above whisper, making the dimensionally-shifted shinobi sigh in his mind at how she was behaving so meek with him right now. He gave her a nod, telling her to continue. "I wanted to thank you for what you did yesterday." The white-haired girl said, now sounding a bit bolder and more like she normally was. "I-I know it didn't end as well as we had hoped, but... You did your best to help Gina..." It was clear that it was hard for Amelia to talk about this, and Naruto couldn't fault her for this.

"Nah, I just did what was right." He said, waving his hand dismissively, but quickly seeing that this came out as quite rude, added: "...I'm really sorry for your loss, Amelia-san, and I wish I could have done more, but, alas, her death was beyond the control of anyone." For a moment he considered sharing his suspicions about Gina's perishing the whitehead, but quickly decided against it. The girl, like all of her comrades, was quite distressed at the moment, and so she might take his mere guess as an undisputed truth, which, coupled with how much power she had over the other E-Pandora, could lead to some really bad consequences...

"Still..." Amelia said. "Thank you." She fell silent then, and Naruto too didn't know what to say next: even if he had experienced his share of losses, he himself never really had to comfort anyone in such a situation.

**~/ *** \~**

About a quarter of an hour before the dinner was to start, an announcement was made through the intercom system: a meeting for all Pandora and Limiters, as well as the members of the Chevalier staff would be held at the mess hall in fifteen minutes... Deciding that he will meet Maria, whom he hadn't seen since she had been summoned by the higher-ups, Naruto headed to the mess.

Even though he arrived there with a couple of minutes to spare, quite a few people were in the hall already. Most noticeably, the squad leaders were standing in a row with their respective platoons falling into ranks before them. Whatever this meeting was about, it definitely was going to be something really important: otherwise such discipline would not be required.

Once everyone was assembled, doctor O'Hara, Gendo Aoi and a couple of Chevalier high-ranked members whose names the blond sage didn't care about made their way onto the impromptu stage. At the same moment, following an unspoken command, all Pandora and Limiters came to attention. The red-haired scientist was the first one to speak.

And since Scarlet O'Hara was almost as much of a politician as she was a researcher, her speech lasted for more than just a few minutes, during which she stated that the 'Gina incident' had been caused by the unexpected levels of stigmata corrosion in the E-Pandora's during the synchronization. She also stated that Mark IV drug had worked as good as they could have hoped for. Next, doctor O'Hara said that with some adjustments to the synchronization procedure, such incident should not happen again. Finally, she expressed her regrets for not being able to save Gina and stated that the girl's sacrifice will not be forgotten nor it will be in vain.

Gendo Aoi was the next one to speak, and like the previous time, his speech was quick, dry and to the point. And as soon as he confirmed what Scarlet said about the Mark IV and about the 'Gina incident', he told that twenty minutes after the end of the dinner everyone was expected on the ground wearing sables or appropriate formal clothes.

* * *

The dinner had been a quiet and subdued affair, and once it was finished, everyone hurried back to their living quarters to change their clothes. Naruto and Maria were no different there. Though, while the blond shinobi decided that the black and dark-blue attire he normally wore under his sage cloak was acceptable, his partner actually had nothing resembling proper sables in her wardrobe. Thus, the red-haired proto-Pandora had to materialize some clothes for herself with her volt texture – something she didn't exactly like to do as she preferred real things...

Done with changing their clothes, the duo hurried to the ground. They weren't the first ones to arrive there, but there still was some time before the 'deadline', and those already present were in a disarrangement... Like any other squad leader, it was Maria's job to organize her underlings, and the redhead wasted no time: finding the spot designated to the West Genetics academy, she ordered the Pandora and Limiters from there to fall into rank behind her.

The next couple of minutes was rather hectic as the newly-arrived to the ground people were searching for their squads and what not, but eventually – and just a couple of moments before the deadline – everything got proper. That was when the Chevalier officials, led by Gendo Aoi, arrived, along with a group of four active-duty Pandora carrying what appeared to be a portable pyre with Gina's body already there.

The pyre was placed on the center of the ground – the four Pandora that carried it remained standing next to it as sentries – the ceremony began. Some more words were said by the Chevalier officials, but those were too dry and, well, official. Once all those speeches were said, the Pandora and Limiters were allowed to say their last words to their dead comrade. The E-Pandora, of course, were given the right to do that first, and, Naruto noticed, almost all of them had some of what he supposed were Gina's things in their hands.

As Pandora and Limiters came up to the pyre one by one, most just gave a polite and respectful bow to the fallen girl, but there also were those who did more than just that. Naruto himself said 'sorry' for not managing to save her, before reading a quick prayer for a good afterlife – a prayer he remembered well from the funereal of Sarutobi Hiruzen, the Third Hokage... Maria, who was the next one in 'queue' too said some last words to Gina, and they likely were rather similar to his own, but the Kyuubi jinchuuriki did not pry.

Once everyone paid the final respect to Gina and fell back into rank, Gendo Aoi gave a signal and the active-duty Pandora who so far had been silently and motionlessly standing by the pyre produced torches from somewhere. These torches were set on fire and used to lit the pyre up then, causing the hot flames to rise towards heavens...

**~/ *** \~**

During the next several days nothing significantly-important had happened at the Alaskan base, and using the chance that these calm days presented Naruto and Maria explored the newly-discovered physical aspect of their relationship a little more. True, they both felt a bit guilty about indulging themselves with such activities so soon after their comrade's passing, but the life was going on and so they too had to go on with their lives...

Of course, this period of calmness couldn't lass for long, and during the breakfast of the fifth day since the Gina's 'burial' it was announced that another test for the Mark IV drug will be held the next day. Understandably, E-Pandora were much disturbed by this as the image their 'sister' partially-turned into a Nova was still very fresh in their minds, but doctor O'Hara, who was making this announcement, calmed them down by plausibly telling that they knew why the previous test had turned into a disaster and that they also knew how to avoid the said disaster from repeating.

**~/ *** \~**

The mere fact that she had been asked to stay guard in the laboratory during the test told Charlotte that doctor O'Hara wasn't as sure about being able to prevent 'Gina accident' as she claimed to be. But the blond Pandora wasn't at all disturbed by this. Of course, just standing here while the technical personnel was busying around the various lab machinery was utterly boring, but she was here on an order from her superior officer. That, and somewhere deep down in the depths of her mind the 'Tempest Phoenix' wished for a chance to make up for not being able to eliminate Nova-turned Gina as she had been ordered to back then...

Still, standing down there in test chamber, deprived even of any entertainment – even if it was in the form of observing some data she couldn't comprehend – Charlotte couldn't help but rely on er beloved player to keep herself awake and battle-ready, should something requiring her intervention happen. And, the longer the test was going smoothly, the less effect her music had on her... By the end of the first hour of the tests the blond Pandora was starting to doze off.

Suddenly, muffled grunts of pain got her attention, returning the 'Tempest Phoenix' back into her full battle mode. Quickly finding the source of those grunts, the blonde saw the E-Pandora girl – what was her name again? Rachel? – struggling against the bounds in obvious pain, while the signs of severe stigmata corrosion were showing up on her skin. Yet, she wasn't given an order to intervene, and so Charlotte did not, even if by now it was clear that the situation was not likely to be resolved without causalities.

These tense moments didn't last for long, though: just as suddenly as her transformation started, Rachel broke free from the bounds that kept her strapped to the test table, her appearance distinctively similar to that of Nova-turned Gina. And even though she still hadn't received her orders to take care of this failed experiment, the 'Tempest Phoenix' still attacked – the sound of sirens filling the laboratory was enough for her to know that she ought to intervene...

Alas, having chosen **Tempest turn** as her sole specialty, Charlotte was somewhat lacking in the speed department, thus even with three copies of herself as her support she didn't manage to land a hit on the beast that the Nova-turned Rachel became with her first attack. And just as the blond Pandora closed in for her second attack, the transformed girl released a powerful shock-wave that dispelled the **Tempest turn** illusions and stunned the real Charlotte for a split moment.

And that moment was enough for Rachel's already crystallized into something resembling a ram arm to connect with her opponent's midsection with enough force to send the headphones-wearing girl through a pillar that supported some technical bridge and into a thick metal pipe running along the concrete wall. And the 'Tempest Phoenix' wasn't rising back up as she got her snipe broken in this crash. No, after spending some quality time in the medical ward she'd be as good as new, but right now she could fight no longer...

Seeing that either of the two Pandora in the chamber – the second still being strapped to the test table and in a drug-influenced sleep – the Nova-turned E-Pandora started moving towards the exit from the chamber with her mind settled on causing some serious destruction... As Charlotte, who was supposed to prevent things like this from happening, had been disposed of, doctor O'Hara tried one last thing she could do in order to prevent her experiment gone awry from escaping the laboratory: she turned on the barrier field, moved here from the clones' chamber after the Gina incident, causing pale-orange walls of light to block every possible escape route from the test chamber.

Unfortunately, it looked like some of the calculations involved in the formula of this barrier had been done incorrectly as instead of stopping the transformed girl it made the rate at which her body changed skyrocket. Just a couple of seconds later the mad-made Nova tore through the laboratory walls and headed outside. Even worse, the sensors in the clone chamber had gone crazy, reporting some abnormal activity there: apparently the clones had suddenly woken up and now were a zombie army. At the moment it was not clear, which side they had 'chosen' but Scarlet O'Hara had a gut feeling that it was not humanity's... What the people in the laboratory didn't know yet, aside from turning Maria's clones into its puppets, the Nova-that-once-was-Rachel also opened several gateways for the other Nova to come to and assault the Earth...

**~/ *** \~**

The moment the alarm sirens went on the E-Pandora knew that something went wrong and Rachel was now turning into Nova like it had happened with Gina about a week ago. Yet, no matter how much they wanted to help their 'sister', there was nothing they could do about it, but pray for her soul... More than that, this still was a Nova attack and they had to guard the storage area near their living quarters.

Expecting just one possible opponent, the E-Pandora moved in a tight group, hoping that this way they'd be able to stall their Nova-turned comrade for long enough for some powerhouse to arrive and deal with the situation... Unfortunately for them, the threat was different from what they were expecting in both its type and its numbers...

The entire group froze when they suddenly heard a metal grating fall onto the floor somewhere behind the shelves, and the multitude of mismatched bare-footed footsteps that followed didn't give the girls any confidence. Yet, steeling themselves, they turned around to face their enemy, coming at close quarters with a group of what appeared to be naked teen-aged clones of Maria Lancelot. And these clones were snarling at them, their eyes with slitted pupils glowing an unholy yellow and their teeth bared in an animalistic way...

**~/ *** \~**

That morning it finally occurred to Maria that she could use her rank of a colonel to make the West Genetics girls and boys train at least a bit while they were here. Alas, by the time the red-haired beauty was ready to embody her idea, both Elizabeth and Chiffon, along with their respective Limiters, had disappeared to somewhere, which left only Satellizer, Rana and Kazuya to the tender mercies of 'the Goddess'. Thus, the aforementioned trio, along with the Kyuubi jinchuuriki and Maria herself, were the only ones in the gym when the sirens informed them about a Nova attack.

"Naruto?" The proto-Pandora asked, wanting to employ her partner's sensing abilities to get some idea of what was going on. And the dimensionally-misplaced shinobi appeared to understand her perfectly as he just nodded back, before becoming completely still as he entered his sage mode.

"There's quite some quandary out there." He replied finally after several long seconds. "I can sense a Nova heading towards the base's power generators; there are also about three dozen abnormal signatures that feel almost like you, Maria-chan, in the storage area; and finally I can feel ten or so spatial distortions that – from what I've seen – are the gateways through which Nova come to this world." The redhead showed no visible reaction at the mention of what could be her own clones, but internally she resolved to get to the bottom of this mess... Then the heads will roll. Right now, though, dealing with the alien invaders was more important.

"Where the closest Nova will appear?" In response, Naruto pointed at one of the walls of the gym.

"Two of them, in the yard just outside this building." Alas, with the way the base was built, there were no short routes to get there, which, while not good, wouldn't be so bad, had the Nova not started appearing already... "I hope they forgive me for this." This got everyone, even Maria, confused for a moment, but as the blond jinchuuriki walked up to that wall with an aura of power around him, they all understood what he intended to do.

The young sage proved them all right as he palmed the wall, causing webs of cracks spread across the concrete. With the second strike he succeeded in making a hole in the wall and a moment later he left the gym through it. Maria followed him into the yard a moment later and the remaining trio was hot on their heels; the girls were holding Kazuya arm in arm as they jumped down from the second floor.

Once alfresco, the red-haired proto-Pandora looked around, and what she saw didn't make her happy: smoke and dust were filling the air above several parts of the base, and five Nova of different types could be seen wreaking havoc here and there... Maria turned her attention back to the two anomalies that could be observed in the very yard she and her companions were standing – a grim reminder that more alien monsters were to come. And those didn't make them wait for long as maybe ten seconds later the spatial distortions unleashed two R-type Nova upon the world...

Normally, 'the Goddess' wouldn't even need to exert herself too much to beat those, but this time these monsters were not the only ones out there, and the redhead didn't want other Pandora to get wounded or die because of her sloth: she remembered the grim statistics about the survival rates she had been fed back at West Genetics quite well.

"Time to get serious..." She muttered under her breath. Since she was wearing some training clothes at the moment, she didn't have to worry much about destroying some good things with her transformation, so she went ahead and, materializing her volt weapons, entered her Pandora mode. Her lance remained the same, while the gauntlet on her left hand grew in size till it gained menacing foot-long claws and was covering her hand completely. A copy of this monster-gauntlet appeared around her right hand while several mismatched crystalline protrusions grew out of her upped back. Finally, a couple of big floating shields made from the same crystalline substance materialized to her sides.

The next moment Maria threw her lance at one of the Nova with such speed that it created a sonic boom and blew hole right through the alien's chest... Knowing that she had killed the monster with that attack, the red-haired beauty was already mid-jump towards the other R-type. Sinking the claws of her left gauntlet into the Nova's armor, she re-materialized her lance in her right hand, before driving it through the invader's core. Ripping her lance free, Maria jumped off the dying alien monstrosity and, after doing a back-flip in the midair, landed rather beast-like, leaving gashes on the concrete ground with the claws of her gauntlet, almost back where she had started her attacks from. The two 'real' Pandora present, along with their unofficial Limiter, found themselves staring at the red-haired beauty: she had just destroyed two R-type Nova in under five seconds...

"Still want to fight me in my Pandora mode, eh, Satellizer?" Maria asked as she turned her head to look back at her comrades, allowing them to see her eyes, which now were rather unholy-yellow in color and had slitted pupils... The blond girl in question, still under the effects of the display of power she had just witnessed, just shook her head silently.

**~/ *** \~**

Of course, the information about the massive Nova invasion spread especially quickly, and within a minute of the turned Rachel escape the laboratories, Scarlet O'Hara already knew what exactly her experiments had caused. She'd be lucky if she remained free and alive after this, and it was a sure thing that she'd never be allowed near anything even remotely connected to the Pandora project ever again...

Yet, even if her own prospects weren't that great, the rest of the lab's personal didn't really need to follow her into the Hell, be it figural or literal. So, the red-haired scientist issued an order to her underlying to retrieve the two Pandora from the test chamber and then to head to the shelters. And while they were evacuating, Scarlet headed to the clone chamber – while she had never even thought about the possibility of them getting out of her control like this, there ought to be something she could do to help the Pandora in stopping them.

Alas, while she knew that the base was under the heavy attack from the aliens, doctor O'Hara didn't knew exactly where those aliens were located, and it just so happened that an F-type Nova spawned right next to building, the lower floors of which the laboratories occupied. The invading monster was already being approached by a Pandora squad, yet it still chose to attack the building it was in front of first. The astounding brute strength of a Nova, improved further by the effects of the freezing field, caused thick concrete flagstones to break like a thin ice. The whole building collapsed inwards, burying the underground laboratories under hundreds tons of rubble... It would be almost a week before the body of doctor Scarlet O'Hara will be found...

**~/ *** \~**

Amelia, undoubtedly the strongest of the E-Pandora, found herself barely able to fend of two clones even if she was fighting nearly with everything she had. Her 'sisters', not blessed with even such powers, were having even harder time, and were already falling under the onslaught of the unholy beasts, as could be heard from their ear-piercing cries of pain...

Almost out of desperation, the white-haired girl tried to slash the clones with the blade of her lance, and somehow she actually succeeded in this. Only, there was no blood coming from the wounds dealt: it looked as if the things in front of her were made from some thick bluish gelatine... The next moment the cuts were gone as if it had never been there, yet Amelia didn't allow the darkness of helplessness overwhelm her as she continued to fight this losing battle.

Her resolve – whatever was left from it – didn't last long, though, as soon she noticed one of the clones on the other side of the storage are wielding the ring-blades that normally were Rattle's volt weapon. Whatever horrifying thought had passed through her mind at that moment caused the white-haired E-Pandora to freeze. And this would have cost her dearly if not for a thick energy beam striking the clones she had been fighting squarely on their forehead and blowing the things' heads off completely.

"Sorry for being late, getting there through all this mess wasn't that easy." Elizabeth Mably said as she re-aimed her stigmata satellites at the next clone approaching them.

* * *

Having asked Eugene to assist in the evacuation of the civilian personal, Chiffon, unlike her classmate, didn't have her Limiter with her when she arrived to the storage area – different, because they planned to catch the berserk clones between two fires and quickly destroy them all before they had a chance to spread out and make thing much more difficult for everyone... So, not wasting even a moment, the 'smiling monster' jumped into the fight.

The first clone fell victim to a wide-arc slashing attack, having gained two deep gashes on its head, yet, the brown-haired girl's brain, too focused on fighting effectively without losing control over the blood-thirsty monster that lived inside her soul, didn't register the fact there was no blood as worrisome or even strange... The very next moment another clone tried to attack Chiffon – and this one was wielding the ring-blades previously seen only in Rattle's hands – but it didn't help in any way as a moment later it found Pandora's gauntlet crushing it's neck.

Still, despite their rather beast-like behavior, it appeared that the clones had some actual tactical capabilities and so, once they saw that brown-haired girl attacking them was apparently defenseless, they tried to mob her. The two nearest clones jumped at Chiffon from different sides, but that was not nearly enough to bring the 'smiling monster' down: she just materialized a second gauntlet around her other hand, and, dropping the body of the clone she had just 'killed', she pierced both attackers with her claws. Flipping the bodies off her volt weapons, the West Genetics Pandora turned her attention to the next clones approaching her...

Instead of waiting for their attack, she went on offensive this time and, making a good imitation of a character from a very old RPG game, twirled around like a small hurricane, her claws tearing through anything they came in contact with... Noticing that the clones she had previously beaten were starting to stand up, ready to continue fighting, the brown-haired Pandora stopped her current attack and almost instantaneously shifted behind the recovering clones with her **illusion turn** before tearing them into pieces again.

A new pair of clones jumped at her from the sides, but Chiffon stopped them by gripping and then crashing their heads with her gauntlets. Still, while she was busy with those two, another unholy creation tried to attack her but with a powerful kick to its midsection the brown-haired girl sent if flying back, thus dealing with this assaulter as well...

Suddenly, she felt a pair of cold and surprising strong yet not completely solid arms wrap around her torso. She tried to kick it off herself, but achieved nothing as the thing was seemingly incapable of feeling pain and its grip was too strong. Trying to use her famed **illusion turn** too achieved nothing as the damn thing was still latched onto her and a shock-wave produced by the activation of her Pandora mode yielded no results either... A moment later she felt her clothes, which were made from her volt texture, melt away and now she could feel the cold gelatine-like flesh of clone's body against her back as well. Then her world became filled with unmeasurable pain as her stigmata were forcefully ripped out of her body...

* * *

Elizabeth, being a ranged fighter, had a bit easier time at fending off the clones, but not by much: no matter how much damage she dealt to those unholy things with her Stigmata Satellite System, they didn't stay down and after several seconds were rising up to continue their assault. And as good as Andre was, he appeared to be useless here: the clones were completely immune even to the strongest **freezing fiend** he could produce.

Still, even if the things didn't go as planned, she and Chiffon were able to contain the clones, and that wasn't all that bad already. Not perfect, but acceptable... Hopefully, someone with any idea how to put these things down permanently will arrive soon, but until then, this uneasy stalemate had to continue...

For about a minute everything went pretty well, and Elizabeth was able – even if barely, as her Stigmata Satellites had limited rate of fire – to keep those nine clones that chose her as their target pinned. Then, a first sign of something going wrong came in the form of a shock-wave that usually accompanied the activation of Chiffon's Pandora mode. And a moment later possible entire base heard the 'smiling monster's' shrieking cry of pain.

'_This was very very bad._' A thought crossed blond girl's mind: no one ever, even Naruto, managed to give the ever-smiling brunette anything more than a shallow cut. If those clones managed to make her cry from pain... "Amelia, take Andre and **run**!" Elizabeth ordered, while preparing to enter her own Pandora mode. True, even with it, she won't be able to stop all those clones, but it should let her buy some time for those she was protecting. Even if she was a snob, like almost all rich daughters were, she had some honor in her, and she wasn't about to run away when people's lives depended on her.

"Sempai?" It was quite clear from Andre's tone that he didn't agree with this plan. The West Genetics Pandora directed a glare at her Limiter – something that she almost never did.

"**Now.**" She hissed, indicating that for once she was ready to exert her 'rank' over her partner. At the same time she forcefully cut their **Ereinbar set**, unintentionally sending the dark-haired teen into a state of shock... Shifting her attention to Amelia, Elizabeth repeated her order. "Do it, take him and run!" Call it cowardice, but the whitehead, having seen what those unholy beasts of the clones were capable of, did not need to be told to run trice. So, grabbing still somewhat shocked guy by the back of his clothes, she sprinted away...

Shaking her head, the blonde entered her Pandora mode. Unlike Chiffon's it didn't produce any shock-wave or anything like that. And all visual changes were limited to those glowing rings around her wrists and ankles. But still, this gave Elizabeth a significant boost in power, which she immediately put to a good use by shooting the advancing clones down with her satellites.

The Mably heiress knew that on her own she'd be overwhelmed by this unholy creations and quickly, and her Pandora mode would only give her three minutes at most – once it ran out, she'd be less useful than a civilian here... Still, this self-sacrifice was what she had agreed to when she chose to become a Pandora, and she was not going to back away now, even if it meant that she will not live to see another day... Shaking her head again to clear these dark and completely unneeded at the moment thoughts, Elizabeth got ready to fight till her last breath.

**~/ *** \~**

Today, the humanity will definitely gain some knowledge about various Nova, Roxanne Elipton thought as she and Cassie Lockheart battled an alien that most definitely didn't fit into any of the four types that had been known so far. When the thing first appeared, it looked like a miniature version of an S-type, but as the time progressed, both girls noticed that it grew quite a bit through absorbing silicon compounds from concrete dust and rubble on the ground. Still worse, the Nova had a really thick armor, and even though Roxanne managed to break it on the beast's chest, there was no core there...

Letting out a sigh of frustration, the redhead attacked the monster again, this time targeting its abdomen – the other most likely place for the core. And seeing how the thing was trying to fend the Pandora off itself so actively now, it was quite possible that the guess about the location of its core that the red-haired girl made was a correct one.

Alas, with Cassie being a pure-accel type and, thus, a designated finisher, until the damn core was found and exposed, the best she could do was distracting the Nova, while Roxanne was doing all the dirty work. Sure, not the most well-balanced team out there, but considering the state of chaos the base was in when this massive Nova attack was announced and how Pandora were teaming up on spot, it looked like they still had lucked out...

Back to the battle at hand, the American redhead had proven that she was one of the strongest Pandora for a reason as she managed to weave her way between the strikes that the Nova was raining upon her with its surprisingly agile 'hands' and crack the armor on the alien's abdomen, exposing it's reddish core to the world. Cassie wasn't wasting any time and was already speeding towards it, using her fastest **triple Accel**. Yet, she failed to destroy the core as the beast suddenly turned into a mass of grayish-yellow sand.

"What the fuck?!" The green-haired Pandora from East Genetics swore as she tried to get the damn sand off her clothes... Suddenly the remains of Nova started moving again, and several seconds later the pile of sand reformed into two completely-healed Nova, each just like their 'mother' when it had first appeared. At that moment a single thought passed through the heads of both girls: '_Shit!_'

**~/ *** \~**

Amelia, looked around. It looked like they had ran to some technical area of the base – though, Andre did that not exactly willingly as the white-haired girl still had to hold him by hand to prevent him from running back to where Elizabeth had been seen last – and for the moment they were safe from the abominations that those trice-damned clones were.

And whatever was going on, it looked like the two of them were the only survivors of that... massacre. They needed to inform everyone about the danger those things possessed, but to be honest, Amelia wasn't exactly sure where they were at the moment and it looked like the Limiter next her didn't knew any safe routes out of the room they were in either. And as ill luck would have it, she couldn't see any phone or intercom around either...

Before she could ponder about this any more, the white-haired E-Pandora heard some walls being blown up in the distance. At first she thought that those were nothing more than the sounds of the battles that were going on outside, but that idea was quickly dismissed from her mind as improbable as the explosions were clearly happening closer and closer to her current location – it was like something sinister was making a beeline towards her.

Since whatever was causing those explosions definitely wasn't friendly, Amelia re-summoned her lance and got into her fighting stance. Likewise, Andre next to her was preparing to do whatever he could do to help her in case they really had to fight for their lives... Several really tense seconds later the wall in front of them blew up, filling the air with thick clouds of dust. Yet, through this dust they still could several pairs of glowing yellow eyes that most definitely belonged to the unholy creations that those clones of Maria were.

For a couple of moments nothing moved. Then three of the five clones rushed into a melee attack, and Amelia quickly noticed that they were now even faster and stronger than before, while still being immune to the **freezing field**'s effects, no matter how much Andre tried. So, as there was nothing they could do to defeat these things, the duo tried to run away from them. In hindsight, turning their backs to the clones that were yet to actively join the 'fight' was a very stupid idea, but, thankfully, those two abominations didn't attack them...

Or did they? A several bursts of energy beams shot from behind the dust cloud that was still partially hiding the remaining pair of clones. And while none of those were aimed either at Amelia or at Andre, these attacks did block all (other) exits from the room with concrete rubble. Since these beam weapons originally belonged to Elizabeth, the white-haired E-Pandora almost asked her what the fuck was going on, but her eyes told her that it was not the blonde girl, but a clone that stole her volt weapons, that attacked them.

Since Amelia had been nothing more that acquaintances with the fallen Pandora, the sight of one of those unholy creations wielding her weapons, while undoubtedly fearsome, didn't affect her really that much. The dark-haired teen next to her, though, having been Elizabeth's partner and lover, fared much much worse as he all but froze in place, despite the other clones approaching him, thus leaving the whitehead to protect them both completely on her own...

Before the white-haired girl could even think of anything she could do to improve their current situation, the clone that was in possession of the Elizabeth's Stigmata Satellites attacked, firing two powerful energy beams. Since Andre was still in shock and likely will not be able to dodge, Amelia had defend him from this attack, which she did by placing the blade of her lance in the beam's path. It looked like she had lucked out as it did the trick, even if the blade was almost completely melted now.

Throwing her now-useless volt weapon at the unarmed clone trying to sneak up on them with enough power to damage its head and put it out of fight for several seconds, the last of the E-Pandora reformed her lance. Just in time to block a wicked-looking dagger that once was a volt weapon of one of her 'sisters'. Using her lance like a short battle staff, Amelia threw the clone away from herself before turning around sharply and driving her lance through the stomach of another unarmed clone that chose her as its prey.

It didn't stop the damn thing completely, though it did slow it quite a bit... Twisting her lance, the whitehead ripped it out through the side of the clone's stomach, causing the abomination to collapse onto the floor. And to ensure that it stayed like that for a bit longer, the white-haired girl drove the blunt end through its head... Suddenly her fighter instincts screamed at her to duck, and Amelia did just that. A moment later she gritted her teeth as searing pain spread across her back – she didn't dodge the attack completely, but, at least, the clone with the dagger failed to cut her spine and she still could fight...

Driving her elbow into the damn clone's head to stun it for a moment, she kicked it away from herself before it could attach to her and do whatever it did the other Pandora. But before Amelia could do anything else, an energy beam shot through her leg just below her knee, causing her to fall onto the floor herself – damn, what a painful reminder that there were more of those abominations in the room...

Standing up and continuing fighting was all but impossible in her current condition, but remaining sitting was an even worse option, so the white-haired E-Pandora forced herself into an upright position, using her lance like a crutch. She immediately had to dodge another beam, and while it was painful and less than graceful, she managed it.

* * *

Alas, while she was busy with saving herself, Amelia left Andre all on his own, and while the dark-haired boy had recovered from his shock, his Limiter techniques were useless against the clones and his rather limited knowledge of martial arts proved to be not much more effective. Yet, with the whitehead keeping three of the clones busy, he somehow could weave his way between the jumps of the remaining two. The moment Amelia got shot, though, he got another clone after himself and in just a couple of seconds one of those unholy creations had its cold hands wrapped tightly around his chest.

Since Limiters had to wear normal clothes, the clone couldn't dissolve them like it could do with the ones made from volt texture, but it didn't stop the damn thing: it just shifted towards more liquid form and – much like slime-girls in those ero-mangas – flowed underneath the obstructing shirt. And once the thing found the stigmata that Elizabeth gave him when they formed their bond, it forcefully ripped it out of the teen's body, causing him enough pain to knock him out cold.

* * *

With one of her legs all but useless, Amelia was barely able to move out of the beams' ways – for whatever reason the other clones seemed to stop attacking her and just watched as the whitehead struggled to stay in one piece – and as it took all of her concatenation, she had stopped paying any attention to what was happening to Andre. So, when she heard his cry of pain, followed by a thud of a body falling on concrete, the last E-Pandora was stunned with the realization that she had completely and utterly failed Elizabeth, who had sacrificed her life to let the two of them live...

This momentary shock cost Amelia dearly as she was not able to dodge two more beams in time, and now had a hole through the shoulder of the hand she had her lance in, as well as a heavy wound on the opposite side of her stomach. These were enough to make her collapse on the floor herself, and before she could do anything, the white-haired girl found herself unable to move even a single muscle as the clone that had finished Andre of had her under its **freezing field**. A moment later another clone – the one that was not wielding any 'stolen weapons' – literally wrapped itself around Amelia, flowing underneath her uniform as it was searching for her stigmata.

Finding what it was looking for, the clone tried to absorb the crystals into itself, but something went quite wrong there: the stigmata had somehow completely merged with the girl's flesh and when the O'Hara's creation still tried to absorb them, the reverse happened – Amelia's four stigmata started slowly absorbing the clone instead. The process of integrating alien tissue into her body, though, was just as painful for the white-haired girl and had her scream her throat till it bled before losing her consciousness...

The clone, as soon as it sensed that something was wrong, quickly separated whatever was left from it from the unconscious E-Pandora. The whole group then stood motionlessly as their simple and partially shared minds tried to decide what to do next... Coming to a conclusion that a threat to their existence should be removed from the world of living, the clone with the Stigmata Satellites shot a single beam that pierced Amelia's body, narrowly missing her heart. Since the clones so far hadn't met any human who could continue fighting with such a wound, they believed that they had ended her existence and went searching for their next prey.

Unknown to them, even whatever little the white-haired girl's body had absorbed, was enough to give the last E-Pandora some new powers, the greatest of which was regeneration, comparable only to that of 'the immortal phoenix' Roxanne. And these regenerative powers had already activated, working on keeping the whitehead alive and healing the damage that was dealt to her body...

**~/ *** \~**

Just as Maria had ordered them, Kazuya, Satellizer and Rana went a separate way, looking for a way to be useful in fighting this Nova incursion off. And with the amount of aliens all over the place, the trio had no problems in finding a fight in which their assistance was needed – two french Pandora were fighting an F-type pretty much just around the corner. Those two were pretty good and had quite strong Limiters supporting them, but they could only stall the Nova as they were...

Rana, being her usual enthusiastic self, was the first one to jump into the fray, her wings of light already brought out. A moment later the Tibetan girl ran face-first into a hexagonal 'shield' that the Nova had phased into the existence on her path. Recovering while still in midair, the bluenette did a back-flip before landing on her feet. Making a 'tch' sound from the corner of her mouth, Rana attacked again, this time using her t**empest turn** to create three copies of herself. She was all blocked again, though this time it looked like the Nova was using significantly more power to create those shields.

One of the French Pandora looked at Tibetan girl and nodded to her, before attacking the alien giant using her own **tempest turn**. Somehow, Rana understood the plan, and a moment later she joined the attack. And this time one of the winged bluenette's clones wasn't blocked, showing that the Nova could keep only so many shields up at once.

Satellizer and the remaining French Pandora looked at each other and even though no words were exchanged, they both knew what the other was thinking. Reaching for her own wings, the 'untouchable queen' of the West Genetics sped towards the alien monstrosity using her fastest **triple Accel**. Her French colleague was just a single moment behind her. With the other two Pandora making the Nova use all of its shields on them and the Limiters negating its **freezing field**, they managed to land a good solid hits on the giant.

Alas, they both had volt weapons not really suited for breaking Nova's carapace. At least not in one hit. So they had to attack again, but this time the invader saw them as a bigger threat and blocked them both with the shields. Which, maybe, was a mistake, as it allowed Rana to slip past the force barriers and punch the giant's chest with enough power to crack the armor there. Of course, the Tibetan girl had no time to celebrate this achievement as Nova's arm sucker punched her, sending her into the nearest building. Into as in through the wall...

And while Satellizer might not have exactly liked the girl – she was her rival, when it came to a certain very special Limiter, and not just there – but seeing Rana getting hurt like that still made the blonde rather angry. Summoning a second sword, the girl pushed for more of gates' power, which caused her 'wings' to grow slightly bigger, while a distinctive hexagonal pattern started creeping across the girl's visible skin. Then Satellizer attacked.

While she wasn't able to perform a **quadruple Accel** even like this, her speed still had noticeably increased. The Nova, though, appeared to have no problem with the blonde getting faster as it had phased one of its shields right on the girl's path. Only for the 'untouchable queen' to break through it like it was nothing more than a thin sheet of ice... Bringing her blades together into something that could be a wedge, Satellizer stabbed the alien monstrosity, her weapons breaking through its cracked armor and damaging its core.

This wasn't enough to kill the giant, but it made the thing drop its shields for a moment. And the French Pandora didn't waste this opportunity, delivering the finishing blow before the Nova could recover and counterattack... Seeing that the monster was done for, Satellizer un-summoned both of her blades and closed the sacred gates, before practically running into the building that the Nova had sent Rana flying into. Kazuya was fast to follow her, as he too wanted to make sure that his bluenette friend was alright...

**~/ *** \~**

Julia Munberk, having played her role in destroying some unlucky S-type that had spawned so unwisely close to the Genetics Germany delegation, separated from her classmates and went to look for another Nova that she could help killing. And as she was she was passing by the warehouses of the storage area, her attention was drawn to one of the gates that had a huge hole clawed in it. Interested in what could have done this, the German girl carefully approached the damaged gates and peered inside.

Seeing no movements there, or any signs that something intelligent had set some traps for her there, Julia stepped inside. Getting a better look at the insides of the storage area, she could see that not long ago a major fight had happened there. Bodies of E-Pandora and the destroyed insides of the warehouse could both attest to that.

Interesting thing, Maverick noted, all of the Evolutionary Pandora had only real clothes remaining on their bodies, and their backs were angry-red, sometimes even bleeding slightly from the ugly rips in flesh that corresponded to the places where their stigmata would be... Suddenly, Julia's eyes focused on the body lying a bit away from those of the Evolutionary Pandora. On the body with brown hair barely reaching the girl's shoulders. Chiffon Fairchild, the strongest Pandora in training, lay there on the cold floor, completely defeated and destroyed...

And the thought that there was something capable of doing this to the infamous 'smiling monster' sent cold shivers down the German girl's spine. Yet, as a Pandora, it was her duty to fight against any Nova-related threats to the humanity, and whatever had defeated Chiffon seemed to fit into this category. So, with a heavy sigh, Julia resolved to hunt down the unknown attacker and kill it before it could more damage. Picking a random hole in the wall, Maverick followed he trail of destruction left by the mysterious attacker...

* * *

It wasn't long before Julia caught up with the mysterious attacker. And she was quite surprised to see that it was actually a group of what appeared to be Maria Lancelot's clones. There were nine of them in total, and two thirds of them were wielding various volt weapons that, if the German girl's memory was serving her right, during the mini-carnival belonged to the E-Pandora. The remaining three clones were unarmed, but Julia knew better than to think of them as harmless. Especially after she had witnessed what those things had done back in the storage area.

The appearance of a Pandora in their immediate vicinity didn't go unnoticed by the clones, and they, desiring to steal her stigmata as well, started approaching her. The German girl, though, already had her volt weapon – a pair of sickle-like satellites – out and sent a horizontal cutting wave at the clones as soon as saw them start walking towards her.

Most of them could do nothing to defend themselves against such attack. Actually, only one of the clones remained unharmed as it 'hid' behind an oversized mace that it had stolen from one of the E-Pandora. Another clone managed to partially block Julia's attack with the blade of an hand-axe. The remaining seven, though, were mercilessly cut into two at waist. That, though, didn't slow the clones down for more than a couple of moment: their bodies reformed themselves quickly, leaving no indication that they were ever damaged in any way.

'_So, this is how they had defeated Chiffon?_' Julia wondered. If these things could shrug even such damaged off like it was nothing, then they would have no trouble overwhelming a melee fighter with their numbers. But since she was a ranged fighter, the German Pandora thought, she stood a chance against these abominations if she could keep them away from herself...

**~/ *** \~**

While either of them could fight against Nova effectively even on their own, Maria still insisted on Naruto remaining by her side. It was like the red-haired beauty had a premonition that they soon will face something that would need the combination of their powers to be brought down...

The duo was rounding the warehouses as they were heading to intercept the Nova-turned Rachel before she could damage the base's power generators when something blew a hole in the wall to their right. Not being sure which side those Maria-feel-alike things were, both Naruto and the 'goddess' got ready to defend themselves.

As the dust started to settle down, the duo made out seven silhouettes with glowing yellow eyes. Several moments later the things stepped into the clear view, revealing themselves to look just like teenaged (and very naked) copies of the red-haired proto-Pandora. For a brief moment the Kyuubi jinchuuriki got a very arousing thought about Maria having hot group sex with herself, but he quickly purged it from his mind – there was no time for such perverseness on the battlefield. Especially since the clones didn't appear to be friendly...

More shocking, though, was one of the clones wielding a pair of clawed gauntlets, that looked just like Chiffon's, as its (stolen) volt weapon. Not only that, but it also had crystalline slabs sticking out of its back forming something akin to wings as well as a pair of big crystalline shields, much like Maria's, floating besides her... The other clones had some volt weapons as well, but those were not nearly as ...outstanding.

The blond sage cast a quick glance at Maria and could see that she was more than just a little angry at the sight of her clones, though he could only phantom what was she was going through at the moment. But before anything else could happen, the gauntlet-wielding clone attacked them, with the others following its example, and the 'goddess' had to abandon her rage in favor of cold battle concatenation.

Grabbing the thing by its hands, the red-haired proto-Pandora crashed her opponent's gauntlets with a loud crack resounding across the yard. Almost immediately, four energy balls started charging up on the clone's 'wings'. Another moment later, the abomination fired the beams, but Maria's shields blocked them all nicely, even if the redhead was thrown back a couple of meters by the resulting explosion. Scowling at how troublesome her opponent was, the 'goddess' launched her own attack as she closed the gap between herself and her clone, before throwing a mighty punch at it.

The unholy creation followed its prototype's example and tried to protect itself with the shields. It kind of succeeded in it too: while both shields were smashed into pieces by Maria, the clone itself remained untouched by that attack. This all, though, was just a minor set-back for the angry proto-Pandora, who kneed her opponent with enough power to cause _it_ to stumble. Not giving the clone a chance to recover and counterattack with its reformed gauntlets, Maria grabbed the thing by its head, before slamming it against the ground with such strength that a web of deep wide cracks spread across the concrete flagstone, while the clone's head was reduced into an unearthly bluish goo...

As soon as that clone was (temporarily) out of the fight, the remaining six immediately stopped mobbing Naruto, who had been doing his best to keep them contained with this sage techniques and doton and fuuton ninjutsu, and started attacking Maria instead. The first pair tried to attack their 'prototype' from different sides, but the 'goddess' had dealt with them easily as she grabbed one of the clones by its hand and, twirling around, threw it at the other, sending them both crashing into the warehouse's wall. A moment later Maria's thick lance was driven through their midsections.

The remaining four clones tried to overwhelm the 'goddess' by attacking her all at once, but before they could touch her they got momentarily stunned by Naruto's kunai striking them on the backs of their heads. And that moment was enough for the red-haired proto-Pandora to tear them all in halves with the claws of her right gauntlet... For a second Maria thought that the fight was over. But then she suddenly saw something move right in front of her. Only her quick reaction allowed her jump back fast enough to avoid having her feet cut off by the gauntlet-wielding clone, that seemed to have recovered form having it's head squashed...

"What the?!" The 'goddess' asked out aloud. "Are these things immortal or what?" Looking around, she could see that the pair of clones that she had nailed to the warehouse's wall with her lance had 'melted' off it and currently was reforming their bodies to human-like shapes. The last four too were starting to recover...

Blocking the incoming barrage of energy beams with her shields, Maria re-materialized her lance back in her hands and then drove the said lance both through attacking clone's own shields and its head. Not stopping there, the red-haired proto-Pandora threw the thing's damaged body up into the air. The next moment she un-summoned her lance and catching the clone with her both gauntlet-clad arms, the 'goddess' tore it into two, before throwing the halves in different directions.

* * *

Naruto had little troubles with understanding what his partner was trying to accomplish now: Maria was trying to find out, what the clone's regeneration's limits were – anything that could help with killing these abominations permanently. It was a wise strategy, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki decided, and not wanting to be useless in this fight, he decided that he too should use it.

Picking the pair of the clones that his sexy partner had used for a target practice earlier as his opponents – this way, unless he was using some really powerful techniques, he would not interfere with Maria's own fight – Naruto started dicing the unholy creations with powerful wind blades. And the Kyuubi jinchuuriki soon noticed that while the clones could recover from any amount of damage, the move parts they were cut into and the further away from each other these parts were, the longer it took them to reform...

Maria too seemed to have noticed that, as the blond sage could see that she was now trying to sherd the abominations they were fighting into the tiniest pieces. Still, no matter what they had tried so far, the things kept coming back... And not wanting this fight to drag on, Naruto decided that maybe should bring out the 'big guns'. Spawning a couple of sage-level **kage bunshin** to keep the clones occupied for some time, the young demon container jumped back and, summoning another shadow clone, started preparing his (in)famous **rasen shuriken** technique.

"Get away from there!" Naruto shouted to his partner as soon as the bladed ball of compressed wind was ready, and the redhead, seeing the jutsu he was holding in his hands, immediately followed his 'order'. The clones that had been Maria were momentarily unsure what to do by her sudden departure, and that was when the young sage threw the **rasen shuriken** at them... Not wanting to experience the death from his own technique, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki quickly dispelled his shadow clones, before they got obliterated by his jutsu. The technique hit the ground roughly in the center of the clones' group, and a moment later a huge dome of deadly winds appeared, grinding anything within itself into a fine dust.

"Wow." The 'goddess' breathed out as she peered into the perfectly semi-spherical crater left by Naruto's **rasen shuriken**, trying to see any signs that the damn clones were coming back. Even after a minute she couldn't see any, and so Maria allowed herself a sigh of relief – fighting those abominations wasn't that easy even for her, and the longer that fight continue, the harder for her it became as, unlike her, the clones didn't seem to tire...

Raising her eyes, the red-haired beauty could see that the Nova-turned Rachel was still slowly floating towards the base's power generators. And since it looked like the Pandora around the base were still busy trying to the other invading aliens, it looked like she and Naruto would be the one to fight the 'boss'. Still, having managed to find those unholy creations' weakness, Maria knew that everyone else needed to be notified about it – according to the Kyuubi jinchuuriki there were more of those abominations running around the base...

A simple nod towards him was enough for the young sage to understand what his partner wanted him to do. So, forming a cross-shaped hand-seal, he summoned a single shadow clone. Already knowing what was is purpose, the doppelganger immediately headed to the command center to deliver this important information to the Chevalier higher-ups, who would then forward it to all Pandora out there.

Meanwhile, Maria and Naruto himself were speeding towards the human-made Nova in hopes of intercepting and stopping it before it could do any serious damage to the base's power generators...

**~/ *** \~**

Roxanne once again breathed a sigh of relief as she sat on the ground: killing that multiplying Nova was much harder than either she or Cassie could have imagined when they first engaged it. Especially since its copy was working in almost perfect sync with the original one, making it extremely hard for the Pandora duo to land a hit on either of the two aliens – hell, they barely managed to off one before a new generation of copies was to spawn...

Thankfully, a group of German Pandora had come to assist them in this fight, thus allowing a rather quick victory over the damn Nova. But it still looked like their day wasn't over yet, even if they had already played a significant role in destroying the invading alien forces – the announcement that was suddenly made through the base's communication system made that quite clear:

"Attention, all personnel! It was reported that the base is currently under an attack from an enemy that appears as multiple clones of colonel Maria Lancelot. Clones can be distinguished by the lack of clothes and varying volt weapons... The clones show basic level of teamwork and possess an ability to restore themselves from nearly any amount of damage dealt to their bodies..." Roxanne was sure all Pandora that could hear this announcement had one very same thought running through their heads. This thought being 'oh fuck!'. "However, it was discovered that if separated into too many pieces, the restoration fails. Also, since the clones do not appear to possess a significant **freezing field**, use of conventional weapons should be possible. Flamethrowers are believed to be the most effective." The message was repeated once more.

"I have a bad feeling about this: an opponent that will keep coming back until you atomize it... I'd rather fight an S-type on my own." One of the German Pandora said quietly. Alas, fate is such a bitch, and so, just as soon as the girls and boys had laughed this off, a group of clones, led by the one with Julia's Stigmata Satellites, appeared from around the corner, slowly approaching them...

**~/ *** \~**

Maria and Naruto managed to reach the Nova-turned Rachel before she could do anything to damage the base's power generators, albeit, if they had been a little bit slower, they wouldn't have made it there in time. And knowing that they had no time to waste, the red-haired proto-Pandora quickly materialized her lance, before throwing it at the human-made Nova in attempt to one-shot it. Alas, it wasn't going down this easily: moving it's massive 'arms' in front of it's chest, the thing attempted to shield it's core. And while Maria's lance blew a hole through those appendages and damaged the armor on the beast's chest, it failed to even scratch its core.

"Fuck!" The 'goddess' swore: they needed to off this Nova fast, or, the chances were, it would damage the reactors and cause some nasty fallout... "What the?!.." Suddenly, both she herself and Naruto noticed that something was happening to the Nova's lower body: the alien flesh looked like it was rippling, as if preparing to give birth to something nasty. Some fifteen seconds later out of these ripples a large number of strange creatures emerged. The little creepers were the as tall as a pony and had pillow-shaped bodies with four legs and nasty beaks on the underbellies... As soon as these strange things fell onto the ground, they straightened up and started pattering towards both Maria and Naruto, obviously to rip them apart while the Nova itself continued its quest of destruction. "So, this is how it kept Pandora from killing it so far?" The red-haired beauty asked rhetorically.

"I'll occupy them." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki said. "You deal with their 'mother'." And as soon as he received a nod of confirmation from his partner, the young sage summoned a couple of shadow clones, and together with them created a wave on the ground, sending the creepers flying away from Maria. Not giving the creatures a chance to recover properly and counterattack, the blond trio charged at them with **rasengans** in their hands...

Trusting her partner to keep these little annoyances away from her, the 'goddess' returned her full attention to the Nova, which, by now, had completely recovered from the damage it took from her lance. Deciding to forget about 'ranged' attacks as useless, Maria jumped at the Nova, using her floating shields to protect herself beast's punches. And while the shields got almost completely destroyed, the redhead managed to sink her gauntlet's claws into the chest armor of the alien being. Re-materializing her lance, the red-haired proto-Pandora got ready to drive it though the monster's chest. Without a warning, a beam-like appendage sprang from a ripple on the armor, hitting Maria on her chest and sending her flying into the wall of the base's power plant.

"Ugh... That hurt." The 'goddess' breathed out as the straightened up... Looking up at the Nova, she saw it charging up a ball of energy as it prepared to unleash a devastating particle beam. "Oh no, you don't." Alas, it looked like there was no way she could interrupt the monstrosity's attack. Still, if the beam hit the power generators, it'd be a catastrophe... Hoping that this would work, Maria waited till the very last second, before throwing her lance, aiming at the ball of energy. A moment later the Nova fired the beam. The tip of the lance, acting like a quoin, split the beam, making it miss the original target entirely.

De-materializing her lance, which got almost completely melted, and re-materializing it in its proper state into her hands, while simultaneously repairing her shields, Maria got ready to attack again. This time, though, she was going to take the Nova's ability to pull sudden tricks into the account. With that in mind, the redhead threw her lance at the beast's core, making it shield it's chest with its arms... Not really caring to see what would happen up there, the 'goddess' dashed forward and once she was almost in front of the Nova, she re-materialized her lance and thrust it into the monster's lower body. Of course, this did no real damage to the beast, but, then again, it wasn't the purpose if this attack...

Pulling herself onto her lance and using it like a ledge, Maria jumped upwards. The Nova appeared to understand what the proto-Pandora was trying to do, and so it tried to send the annoying redhead away with its powerful punch, but, sacrificing one of her shields to protect herself, the red-haired beauty continued her attack... At the apex of her jump, she used the claws of her gauntlet to attach herself to the beast's armor and, before it could throw her away like it did the last time, she jumped off. Landing onto the Nova's hand – the very one the thing tried to punch her with a couple of seconds ago – the proto-Pandora once again re-materialized her lance, before making a leap towards the monster's core. With her attack coming from this close, the Nova had its chest armor as the sole defense of its core, and it was not nearly enough to stop Maria's lance...

Her mission accomplished, the red-haired beauty jumped off the dying beast, before it had a chance to do anything nasty to her. Alas, it looked like that wasn't enough: the Nova started inflate, like a balloon, causing Maria to freeze for a moment. Having seen the aliens do such a thing once before, she knew exactly was was going to happen: the monster was about to self-destruct.

The commanding officers seemed to recognize the situation as well, and were telling all fighting personnel to hurry to the shelters... Alas she, just like Naruto were too close to Nova and too far from the nearest shelter to make it in time. And there were no known ways to stop the monster's self-destruction... It was just like the last time...

Suddenly, Maria noticed a body of one of those walking-pillow-things with something written on it flying towards the inflating Nova. A moment later the inscribed seal flashed for a moment with strange symbols appearing around it. Then, a rapidly-expanding black sphere emerged, 'swallowing' the Nova a mere second later. Once this black sphere was around fifty meters in radius, it flashed for a moment, before something like a small black hole opened in its center, swallowing up everything withing the sphere. Once there was nothing left, the black hole disappeared and the barrier – that is what the black sphere was – vanished. Alas, this created a vacuum bomb, as masses of air rushed to fill the previously empty space, but it still was preferable to the Nova's self-destruction.

Recovering from the effects of the pressure shock wave, Maria looked at only man she knew, who could have created that seal: Naruto. And she could see him standing there among the corpses of killed creepers, surrounded by quickly fading shroud of the Kyuubi's yoki. There were no red rings around his eyes, indicating that he lost his sage mode sometime during this battle, but definitely didn't stop him from saving everyone from the self-destructing Nova...

"Thank you." She mouthed to him. He just smiled back at her.

"Shall we go help others?" Naruto asked as he walked up to her. Maria almost answered 'yes', but then she noticed several Chevalier VTOLs approaching the base, obviously carrying a platoon or two of high-level Pandora.

"Nah, let them do the dirty work." She said as she gave in to her laziness.

* * *

That's all folks  
leave me a **Review**!


	9. Survivors

Story revive!

*** Review response**:  
**Jose19**, **ZairiX**, **Lord Fic**, and everyone else who was waiting patiently for the update: sorry guys, the last half-a-year was pretty hard on me. I had to take a completely new topic for my diploma (CS major now, though ^^), and then there were more and more tasks from my work piling up as well... At least I'm more or less done with those now, so expect the updates to go back to once in a month schedule.  
**dregus**, considering what is going on in manga now... you can say they got off with a scratch here. Still, this was much more brutal than in canon, yes.  
**Jebest4781**, official ceremony? Are those even really official? And even if, don't forget that Maria isn't really a Pandora as we know them...  
**Thanatoss**, **sh8ad8ow**, **Argorok**, **edboy4926**, **Unknown Sterata**, **BladePhoenix41**, **Soutrick**, **ManlyMonk**, **AstralJean**, **NARUHAREM FOREVA**, **sabery**, **Yuri-Hime-Chan**, **fanficreader71**, **Arct1cfox**, **DigitalButton**, **Toby860**, **Guest**, **Luke Dragneel**, **Markus-Antonius**, **Veldrisk**, **Gbds**, **isseixrias**, **Darkth Shadow**, thank you for your reviews, folks.  
**Kamen Rider Arashi**, that arc had already happened and was resolved like it was in canon without either Naruto or Maria doing anything. And I'm not sure there will even be an opportunity for them meeting the other L Bridgets anytime in the near future.  
**cj1of4**, not really - if their bodies can handle the implantation of a new set of stigmata, they may return. Most of them, though, will quit because of psychological factors.  
**Akuma-Heika**, you want a full lemon, I take it? Might try writing one sometime the next chapter.  
**Hellfire44**, no, he was spirited away to Freezing universe while he was still being transported to the Turtle.  
**Lazyman12**, Chiffon went down so easily because she's a melee fighter (with a very short reach) who got caught by an unexpected comeback of the enemy she thought she had put down. In this regard, someone like Amelia with a spear/polearm will have actually an advantage over a close-up-and-personal monster like Chiffon because of an extended reach: they have an extra milliseconds to react.

*** Jutsu list**: **Shinobi techniques**:  
**Kage bunshin** - (B-rank) Shadow clone - creates solid doppelgangers of the user, using just his/her chakra. Clones can do all of the creator's techniques, but will dispel after receiving any significant damage. Destroyed or dispelled clones give their memories to their creator.

* * *

**Disclaimer**: I DO NOT own "_**Naruto**_" or "_**Freezing**_". No profit is being made. Oh, and I borrowed some names from other anime & manga. I don't own those either.

"speaking"  
'_thinking_'  
"**speaking of the higher beings** / **jutsu** / **speaking in power ****mode**"  
'_**thinking of the higher beings**_'

* * *

**chapter IX: Survivors**

Maria, being the ever-understanding soul she was, gave the Chevaliers twenty four hours to solve the base's problems that required their immediate intervention. And once this time was up, the redhead was on her way to the temporary conference hall with her proverbial gloves off – she needed them to answer her questions about why there were her clones running around the base during the Nova assault, and why these clones were causing troubles for Pandora.

Of course, not wanting their meetings interrupted without due cause, the Chevalier higher-ups had posted a secretary from the numbers of retired Pandora next to their temporary conference hall to keep the unwanted people from interfering with their businesses. And against the base's personnel and the guesting Pandora from the academies it worked well enough... Maria, though, was an entirely different case: the poor thing didn't even dare to 'eep' when the red-haired 'Goddess', surrounded by an almost visible aura of power, walked past her.

* * *

Chevalier officials definitely were humans, and many-hours-long meeting were taxing on them, hence their need for coffee breaks every now and then. And one such break was announced by Gendo Aoi once the estimate for base repairs had been approved. But before anyone could even stand up from their seats, there was a polite knock on the doors. A knock that somehow sent shivers up everyone's spines.

"Yes, what is it?" Gendo asked, curious as to what the secretary – he presumed it was her – wanted. Instead of a verbal response, all he got was someone trying to open the hall's doors and failing as the said doors had been locked as soon as the meeting had started several hours ago. That didn't stop the 'intruder', though: a moment later five volt-texture claws pierced the doors around the lock and in one swift motion cut it out. Then the doors were pushed open, revealing the one and only Maria Lancelot, who, despite being dressed in a deceptively-cheerful dress, looked like a fury incarnate.

"You can put this on my tab." She said as she carelessly threw the cut out lock behind her back. She didn't dismiss the clawed gauntlet from around her left hand, though. "And now that I have your attention, gentlemen..." The redhead continued, sitting down on the corner of the kitchenette and folding her hands on her chest while sending a glare at the assembled Chevalier officials. "...I want some answers."

"Y-yes, what do y-you want to k-know, Maria-sama?" One of the officials, whose name she didn't really care about, asked. Judging by the way he was stuttering, she had made quite an impression on him with her 'entrance'... At the same time, Gendo had audibly swallowed, apparently having a good idea, what his one-time-partner was going to ask.

"Quite simple, can you explain me, why there existed clones of myself? And why they were under the Nova's control during the battle?" The head of the Aoi family sighed: his guess proved to be one hundred percents accurate. Not that it helped him or his colleagues any... Those thoughts proved to be rather distracting and he didn't even notice that the silence in the room lasted for quite some time already, until the voice of the 'Goddess' brought them all back to the reality. "I'm waiting."

"At this moment, I'm afraid, we can tell you nothing that you don't know already." Gendo replied carefully. "The appearance of your clones was as surprising to us as it, undoubtedly, was to you. They had been created without permission or knowledge of the Chevalier organization, and a thorough investigation into their origins will be launched once we've dealt with the immediate aftermath of this Nova incursion. Until then, I can't tell you much more, Maria." The redhead kept glaring at the man for several more seconds, before nodding once.

"Very well." The 'Goddess' replied. "But I want to be a part of this investigation as well. I want to know who did _this_ and for what reason." She said in an ultimatum tone. Not that anyone was going to deny this request of hers...

**~/ *** \~**

While his partner was away to ...speak with the old men, Naruto wandered around the partially-ruined base, looking for something that he could do. And since the first teams of workers were already clearing up the debris from the destroyed buildings, the dimensionally-misplaced blonde decided that he could help them: his shadow clones were quite useful for such labor after all...

At least he thought so, until it was explained to him that in many cases, the equipment buried under the rubble was quite volatile and could explode or unleash some nasty substances if uncovered carelessly. Still, the man in charge of base reconstruction was not the one to dismiss an army of free workers just like that, so he brought the Kyuubi jinchuuriki to the destroyed section of the warehouse block – nothing under the rubble here was even remotely dangerous, so the blond shinobi could clear the site in any way he liked... The only condition that the man had set was that should Naruto no longer desire to help – as someone of a similar status to Limiters, he had no obligations to help with the base reconstruction this way – he had to inform him about it.

**~/ *** \~**

As her consciousness slowly returned to her, Amelia found herself in the medical bay. She didn't even need to open her eyes to gather as much – even with the super-tech machines used to treat Pandora's wounds, the Chevalier organization's hospitals still had that unmistakeable smell of antiseptics... Concatenating on herself, the white-haired girl tried to evaluate her condition. Her body felt so damn heavy, like it was turned into lead, and her upper back, especially around the stigmata, was sore and inflamed, while the bio-crystals themselves felt like they became solid fires. If not for the combination of painkillers and the natural toughness that came from being a Pandora, the Amelia was sure she'd be screaming in pain from the very moment she woke up...

Since she was alive, in one piece, and likely to be released from the hospital once that damn thing with her stigmata was sorted out, the whitehead looked around. Even from her own experience she knew that the rooms in this particular medical bay were designed just for a single patient, yet she could see two more Pandora sharing the room with her – a great testament of how damaging a Nova incursion can be. Despite the brain-splitting headache that the bright lights were giving her, Amelia studied her temporary roommates.

Closer to her was a blue-haired Himalayan girl from West Genetics, Rana or something like that – she had only heard her name from the other West's Pandoras' and Limiters' dialogues. Anyway, by the looks of it, the bluenette had suffered some serious concussion and probably had several broken bones. To be honest, it looked like something had thrown the poor girl through a concrete wall, and knowing just how powerful Nova were, that was quite possible.

But if this girl got it bad, the final occupant of the room had it even worse. Of course, even if Amelia had no positive feelings towards that short French girl – Charlotte Bonaparte – she didn't want her crippled or anything like that either. Yet, the blonde was there, strapped tightly to her bed in order to ensure that no sudden movements on her part undid all the work done to restore her broken spine. There, of course, were other injuries, but they were mostly superficial and fading out already... Any further thought of the white-haired e-Pandora were interrupted by a nurse walking into the room.

"Ms. Evans, you are awake, how are you feeling?" The nurse asked. And given the condition she was in, Amelia did not really care about the way it sounded: she just honestly answered the question – after all, with all those sensors wired up to read her vitals, the doctors will immediately know if she lied about this one.

"Like shit." The whitehead croaked out. The nurse gave her _the look_, but otherwise didn't comment on this less that delicate response. Apparently, that was close enough to how they thought she'd feel when she woke up...

* * *

It had not been easy for Amelia, but she managed to get some information from the nurses about what had happened to her 'sisters' from the e-Pandora project. Apparently, she was the only one remaining, all others had lost their stigmata to those clones. And more than just a few had lost their lives as well, mostly to the combination of bleeding wounds and Alaskan chill. Even those that managed to survive likely would never be able to rejoin the program.

The very thought that she had failed her 'sisters' and her comrades so much made Amelia's heart bleed with guilt and shame of not being able to do more to protect those girls, like she should have done. She had no idea how she will be able to face those who had lived or how she'd dare to show her face on the funerals for those who didn't... She had absolutely no idea...

**~/ *** \~**

Having fully accepted that she may and, likely, will die in that battle, Elizabeth Mably was a bit surprised when found herself waking up in the medical bay. Her back felt sore and she could feel empty and inflamed cavities in places where her stigmata used to be... The Brit girl also could feel the aftereffects of chilblain in her entire body, but aside from that and several minor cuts and bruises, she seemed to have no other injuries. Calling herself lucking in such a state might not be exactly right, but considering that she had passed out in the middle of the battle she was sure, she could have ended in a much worse state...

Opening her eyes and looking around, the Mably heiress could see that she wasn't alone in the room, even though it was originally designed to hold only a single patient. There were two other Pandora there, presumably, both suffering from the loss of stigmata as well. Unfortunately, Elizabeth couldn't quite recall their names, as West Genetics' delegation barely ever interacted with their Indian and Brazilian colleagues.

Almost immediately Elizabeth's thoughts snapped to her Limiter and her beloved, Andre. He wasn't there next to her and the fear of worst started tightening its grip around the blonde's heart. After the two years they had been together, she quite frankly couldn't imagine her life without him anymore. What would she do if he had perished? What... Gritting her teeth, the young woman forced herself to calm down. Her Andre was stronger than that; he wouldn't die that easily. And, until she is proven otherwise, she should believe that he had lived through this nightmare as well...

* * *

It had been quite some time, or at least it felt like that to Elizabeth, before a nurse came to check on her. Then again, the blonde thought, she shouldn't really be surprised by this: as a Pandora who no longer had her stigmata, she wasn't worth all that much to the Chevalier organization. At least not when compared to those girls who still managed to keep their stigmata from being taken by the clones.

The first thing that the nurse did was reading the data from the various medical machines connected to the Mably heiress's body. And once she was done with that task, she asked the blond girl how she was feeling. Elizabeth, as politically correct as possible – she had quite a strong desire to include several curse words into her answer, but didn't do that – described her current condition. The nurse had asked several more question, which were aimed to get more specifics about how Elizabeth was feeling, and once those were answered, the woman told her that the food will arrive soon and was about to leave.

"May I inquire about several other people?" The blond girl asked, stopping the nurse at the room's doors. "Just their conditions, nothing that should be breaking your oaths." The nurse hummed something under her nose for some time, before answering in an affirmative way. "Do you now what had happened to Andre Francoise? He is... was my Limiter, and I'm very worried about him."

"There were only three Limiters that had died during the incursion, and as far as I know, none of them was name Andre." Elizabeth allowed herself a sigh of relief upon hearing the nurse's word. "But as he hadn't come to visit you yet, I'm afraid, he must still be unconscious. There were quite a few Limiters who had their stigmata stolen, and none of them has waken up yet; all other Limiters had been already released form our care." Not exactly good news, but knowing that her partner was alive was enough for the blond girl.

"Thank you." The Mably heiress said with a polite bow of her head, before asking her next question: "And what about Chiffon Fairchild?" This time the nurse was silent for quite a few seconds, before she gave her answer:

"Ms. Fairchild had lost her stigmata and is unconscious at the moment." This made Elizabeth raise an eyebrow. Chiffon had always been the strongest one among the Pandora of the West Genetics; surely she should have woken up. With these thoughts in her head, the blond girl had voiced her disbelief about to the nurse. "Unfortunately, this is not the case here, Ms. Mably. Ms. Fairchild had a very high synchronization with her stigmata – the highest one known since Ms. Kazuha Aoi – and so she got the strongest backlash when her stigmata were taken from her. The damage to her nerve system is so extensive that it's unlikely that her body will ever be able to accept new stigmata. That is if she even wakes up; we're not sure she ever will." Elizabeth hung her head, silently praying for her comrade and her classmate's successful recovery.

**~/ *** \~**

Since the Nova attack had left more causalities in need of medical attention than the medical bay was designed for, as soon as someone was physically able to leave, they were discharged so that the remaining patients could have just a little bit more attention from the staff. Thus, Amelia, as someone who didn't receive any truly grievous wounds, was released on the fourth day following the one when she had regained consciousness.

And while it was true that she no longer required any special treatment to finish healing her body – especially with the powers that she had absorbed from Maria's clone had kicked in and granted her enhanced regeneration – her mind was another matter altogether. Having become a self-appointed leader and a big sister to all E-Pandora early on, the white-haired girl felt that somehow it was her fault that only she had survived the fight with the clones (more or less) intact, while the others were either dead or permanently removed from the program due to the extent of their injuries...

Releasing someone with such a strong survivor's guilt and self-aimed loathing into a place that had nothing but reminders about her 'failure' with absolutely nothing to do to keep her mind off that... It, in all honestly, was just asking for another death, but then again, military organizations were never really known to be caring too much about helping their soldiers with their psychological issues...

**~/ *** \~**

Naruto had just finished another of his 'shifts'. Of course, had he summoned an army of shadow clones, instead of a mere dozen, he'd finish with this work in a matter of hours... But the blond shinobi was in no real hurry as such physical work allowed him to keep his mind off some of the more problematic thoughts, a good deal of which was about those unnatural clones of his Maria that had appeared out of nowhere during the Nova invasion earlier.

Anyway, with his 'shift' over, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki headed back to the living quarters he shared with his red-haired goddess. Speaking of her... Naruto entered his sage mode to check her whereabouts. Of course, he was quite sure that Maria was still going over various reports from the ongoing investigation into her clones while seated in one of those temporary conference halls that the Chevalier higher-ups had set up for themselves,.. but he still wished to confirm that to himself.

Sure enough, the red-haired beauty was there, shining like a burning sun: someone like her could never hide from a sage even if they tried... Almost immediately, though, Naruto's attention was drawn to another powerful aura nearby. It actually felt a bit familiar, but the young jinchuuriki couldn't put his finger on whom it belonged to... More curious, though, was the fact that the said Pandora was alone and in the part of the base that was yet to be cleared from the debris left in the wake of the Nova attack. Was she trying to do some training? Possibly, but those few Pandora who trained, used different place for that purpose even nowadays.

A little bit curious of what was going on, the blonde headed to where he had detected that Pandora. It didn't took him long to arrive there, and when he did, he saw Amelia Evans, the now ex-leader of the E-Pandora. And she had changed quite noticeably since Naruto had last seen her, even if only a sage like him could see most of that... He appearance remained mostly the same, though her almost-trademark lock of red hair was gone, meaning that now she was the true whitehead... Far greater changes had happened to her – for the lack of a better term – 'aura', even if normal people would never see those: her life-force was stronger than ever before. Hell, now that he thought thoroughly about it, this new Amelia felt almost like Maria did, even if could never match the 'Goddess' in raw power.

Still, no matter how curious the changes in the last E-Pandora were, they didn't explain what she was doing all alone among the ruins, her eyes red from crying and her hands shaking slightly every now and then... Suddenly, a steel-like determination passed trough her eyes and a moment later Amelia's lance materialized in her hands. The girl twirled her Volt weapon for a moment, before taking it in a very strange grip with the lance's tip pointing upwards. No, not upwards, she was pointing her weapon at her own neck, Naruto realized.

* * *

Fear of unknown, even if often counterproductive, was natural to all living beings. And to those still alive, death most definitely was one such unknown. But much like it is with other fears, in certain cases it was not nearly enough to stop someone from going ahead... Inescapable regrets and misplaced self-loathing often caused one to chose the supposed oblivion of death over the harsh, nightmare-like reality of their life.

And Amelia was so full of hate. She hated herself for being too slow and too weak to do anything more to help the other E-Pandora in their last battle. In her mind, the white-haired girl saw herself as the reason that all of her comrades were either dead or... And even worse, in spite of everything they did, they failed to destroy even a single damn clone. They all turned out to be utter failures, and she was the worst one... Maybe it was just her, clouded by grief and self-loathing, mind, but a failure like her didn't deserve to live...

Of course, the thoughts about her little brother kept Amelia attached to this world for the first few days, but, eventually, even they were no longer enough. Unable to bear with her regrets anymore, the white-haired girl had decided on ending her life. She had written her last letter 'home' earlier today, and right now it was it one of her uniform's pockets: she just couldn't make herself actually send it.

Even though coming to a decision about it was not easy, actually taking her own life was so much harder for the last E-Pandora. Even with her lance already summoned an ready for strike, she still wasn't sure that she'll truly be able to do this. But, once again, her faint-heartedness was pushing her forward... Closing her eyes, Amelia took a couple of slow deep breaths. Then she tried to thrust her lance at her own head, only to find out that she couldn't move it even at all.

"Death is not an escape." A masculine yet soft voice spoke. "You should confront your demons while alive." Daring to open her eyes, the white-haired E-Pandora found herself looking at the blonde young man, known as Uzumaki Naruto, the partner of Maria Lancelot. And he was holding her lance with his hand, preventing her from moving it even an inch in any direction.

Though, considering that he was utilizing that strange power of his – the one that granted him ridiculous strength and durability, while turning his eyes toad-like and surrounding them with red rings – Amelia wasn't really surprised that he was overpowering her so easily. Hell, he probably would be able to do that even without this power-up... The question, though, was no about his powers, but what he was doing there, trying to stop her?

"W-why?" The whitehead breathed out through a sob: the last of her earlier determination was withering away. There was a long silence, before Naruto finally spoke:

"I know, losing those close to your heart hurts, it hurts a lot, but..." The blond shinobi made a short pause to draw a breath, before continuing: "But you shan't blame yourself for this. Mourn, remember, them yes, but never blame yourself for something that was outside of your control." Amelia let out a sob as new waves of tears obscured her eyes.

"But... But, we... If we... If I were better... I could... I could have saved them!.." The white-haired girl started barely in a whisper, but soon she was all but screaming. She also let go of her lance as she threw her hands around in a fit of hysterical rage. It didn't faze the young jinchuuriki even a little bit, though.

"This is war." He stated. "And no matter how much we wish it was not like this, there always will be causalities." Naruto said sagely. "And, anyway, it has already happened, so nothing can change it..." Apparently, this was not the best thing to say... Then again, he was never that good with words, more often than not simply beating his ideas of how to live into others' heads...

Anyway, something clicked inside Amelia's head; she re-materialized her spear back to her hands, before sloppily swinging it the blonde, forcing him to step back in order to avoid being hit. Of course, this had to do more with him being so surprised by her sudden attack, than with the said attack being dangerous... And having forced the young sage away from herself, the white-haired E-Pandora made another attempt at offing herself.

Before she could do anything, she found herself thrown across the yard and into a ruined wall, by Naruto's powerful thrust – somehow, he managed to move her without even touching her directly. A moment later, the dimensionally-misplaced shinobi was right in front of her, his forearm pressed lightly to her neck to ensure that she stayed put.

"You are not the only one who hurts." While he did his best to keep his voice even and calm, it wasn't had to hear some hints of angry hissing in it. "How do you think I felt when my entire home village was leveled by a maniac? I could sense all those lives withering away! And it all was because I happened to be one single minute late! Or, do you think our very own Maria didn't feel bad, when the kids around her perished one after another, unable to survive the integration of Nova flesh into their bodies?" Naruto took a deep breath to clam himself down a bit. "And I'm sure, a lot of people there had suffered too throughout their lives. Yet, we're still there, still strong, and doing our best not to let these sad histories repeat themselves."

Suddenly, the blond shinobi let her go, and Amelia stumbled forward, only to find herself enveloped in a tight hug a moment later. And even though she was actually the older here, the white-haired E-Pandora felt like little girl being hugged by her father.

"I know you're strong too, Amelia-san. You need to keep going." Naruto whispered softly into her ear as he hugged her even tighter. Amelia, though, barely listened to him as she had already dissolved into a sobbing mess. And having absolutely no idea how to handle this situation further, the young jinchuuriki just held the crying girl in his arms...

**~/ *** \~**

Maria Lancelot entered the suite she was sharing with Naruto with a tired sigh as once again barely any progress in uncovering where those clones had come from was made today. And even worse, Scarlet O'Hara – the scientist who was presumed to be their creator – was found dead earlier this morning, meaning that they won't be able to get any answers out of her...

Of course, one of the first things that the red-haired 'Goddess' saw when she walked into suite's room was a white-haired girl, still fully-dressed and with a tear-stained face, sleeping restlessly atop of the bed covers. It took her tired mind maybe a second to recognize this girl as Amelia Evans, the only E-Pandora to keep her stigmata... Sighing softly, Maria shifted her attention to Naruto, who was sitting on a chair next to the head of the bed, reading something out of his scroll while also keeping an eye on the sleeping whitehead.

"So?.. We aren't even married yet, and you already bring other girls to our bed?" The redhead asked as she threw her jacket on the other chair in the room. The blond jinchuuriki leveled a glare in response, making it quite clear to her that he didn't class her attempt at making a joke. "Fine, sorry." Maria sighed as she sat on the edge of the bed, careful not to wake Amelia up. "What happened?"

"She tried to commit suicide. A bad case of survivor's guilt." Naruto replied after maybe a second of silence. "I stopped her and she cried herself to sleep then. Where was I supposed to leave her at? Medical bay is overcrowded as it is, they won't accept anyone without a serious injury. And placing her back at the E-Pandora living quarters would actually be detrimental at the moment, I think..." Indeed, had he done that, it was quite likely that whatever progress he had made in giving Amelia her will to live back would be lost.

"Oh." Was all that Maria could reply at the moment. There was a rather long pause, before she spoke again. "You're still sleeping on the couch, though." This made the blond shinobi raise an eyebrow in a silent question about the reasons for his exile. "This bed is a bit too small for three people." The red-haired 'Goddess' explained – and Naruto knew quite well that she liked it spacious when sleeping... Then again, it was not like he was really planning to sleep tonight as someone needed to keep an eye on Amelia. Just in case. "...Anyway, what are you going to do with her, when she wakes up?" Maria asked after another pause.

"Honestly... I don't know. I'm a front-line fighter, not a specialist in mind walking." The Kyuubi jinchuuriki replied. "I can always make her train so much that she will just have no strength to do anything stupid." His partner shook her head at his admission, but she didn't offer any possible solutions to the 'Amelia' problem either...

**~/ *** \~**

"Are you sure you don't want back into the program?" Rana asked, and several other students of the West Genetics nodded in agreement. While Elizabeth had said this yesterday already, everyone still had a hard time imagining the academy without the cool blonde... The said blonde was sitting on a bed next to her now ex-Limiter, André Françoise – he was finally allowed to have some visitors today, and as such, pretty much everyone from West Genetics had filled into the room he was in.

"Yes." Elizabeth replied, while placing her hand atop of Andre's gently, causing it to stop shaking for the moment. Such tics of his were the most noticeable, though not the only consequences of him having lost 'his' stigmata to those clones. "They say, my Andre will not be able to return. And I just won't abandon him, never again." After all, even though the Mably heiress knew that what had happened to her partner wasn't really her fault, she still blamed herself quite a bit for not being there to protect him.

"While I can't really say that we got along nicely, Elizabeth,.." Satellizer spoke. "I can honestly say that we will miss you. West Genetics will never be the same without you and Chiffon." There was a round of nods of agreement.

"Thank you." Elizabeth replied softly. "It was nice to know you all, and I hope that we'll still keep in touch even after we part our ways. Rana was the first one to reply:

"Of course, _~De Arimasu_..."

* * *

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